Chollywood rising

[GeneChing]

I predict a bounce back in late January with Chinese New Year - the Year of the Flaming ****.


China Box Office Down for Third Month Running (http://variety.com/2016/film/asia/china-box-office-down-for-third-month-running-1201940450/)
Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/cold-war-2-e1465957003912.png?w=670&h=377&crop=1
DECEMBER 13, 2016 | 12:01AM PT

China’s theatrical box office recorded the third consecutive month of decline in November. That puts the full year on course for only a narrow single figure increase.

Theatrical takings in November amounted to RMB2.54 billion, a 5% drop compared with RMB2.66 billion in November 2015. It follows a 19% drop in October and a 33% September on September decline, according to data from Ent Group.

For the year to end of November, Chinese cinemas have recorded gross revenues of RMB41.1 billion, a gain of 3%, compared with the first 11 months of last year. The full-year total was RMB43.9 billion in 2015. December is usually one of the two biggest cinema-going months of the year.

In admissions terms, the first 11 months of this year are 10% ahead of the same point in 2015. Ticket sales reached 1.25 billion, compared with 1.13 billion in January-November 2015.

Average ticket prices have declined by some 15%, from RMB34.9 to a mean RMB30.2. That reflects the weakening, more competitive, market. And it also reflects the expansion of cinema chains into third and fourth tier cities where the cost of living is lower.

China’s film industry regulators have warily allowed more imported films than the normal 34 revenue sharing quotas would suggest. That may give the Hollywood imports a narrow market share victory over China’s local films.

But the 6% weakening of the Chinese currency against the US dollar, spells a reduction in the value of revenues remitted to the stateside headquarters of the Hollywood majors. On Jan. 1 RMB6.49 bought $1. Today it takes RMB6.90 to buy one unit of the US currency.

[GeneChing]

Here's the yin story:

China Box Office Flatlines in 2016 (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-flatlines-2016-957831)
1:40 AM PST 12/20/2016 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn2.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2016/03/press_still_2014-02-16_005-h2016.jpg
Courtesy of Sony Pictures
Stephen Chow's 'The Mermaid' earned $526.8 million in China in February, before the market began to soften.

After expanding 48 percent in 2015, it is projected to grow just 4.5 percent this year — but the picture for Hollywood is slightly rosier.
The year began with projections that China was on the verge of becoming the world's largest movie market, but 2016 might end up being remembered as the year the country's film sector fell back to earth.

For over a decade, China's box office has expanded at least twice as fast as the country's overall economy — from 2003 to 2015, year-over-year growth averaged 35 percent or more, according to state media regulators. The Chinese market's huge performance in 2015 (48 percent full-year growth) and an even bigger first quarter this year (50 percent growth; the territory's first half-billion-dollar movie, Stephen Chow's The Mermaid), left analysts hurrying to bump their forecasts of China's ascendance to early 2017.

But the second quarter delivered a surprising correction: a 4.6 percent year-on-year decline, the territory's first full-quarter slide in half a decade. And the downward trend has only deepened in the second half of the year. From July 1 to Dec. 15, China's box office contracted 10.5 percent compared with the same period in 2015, according to Beijing-based box-office monitor Ent Group.

Thanks to the huge first quarter, box office for the year so far — Jan. 1 to Dec. 15 — is still up 5 percent. But the remaining two weeks could erode that bulwark a little further.

Legendary Entertainment's Matt Damon-starring co-production The Great Wall has injected some much needed energy into the marketplace, opening to $67.4 million last weekend. Local fantasy adventure Mojin: The Lost Legend, however, earned even more during roughly the same window last year. That film debuted to $92 million and went on to earn $255.7 million — a total The Great Wall won't match.

Factoring in the remaining releases of 2016, Ent Group forecasts that China's full-year 2016 growth rate will land at 4.5 percent — way below the 30 percent China's media regulators had targeted.

The forces behind the slowdown have been a regular subject of debate — and hand-wringing — throughout the year. Most industry observers converge around a combination of factors: weaker local films, a crackdown on box-office fraud, cutbacks in last year's generous ticket subsidies from online platforms trying to build market share, overall weakness in the Chinese economy and increased consumer discernment among China's new moviegoers (for a more detailed look at the causes of the slowdown, see here).

Hoping to escape the ignominy of a full-year decline — and the political heat that would come with it — China's regulators turned to Hollywood for help late in the year.

First, they relaxed their usual blackout on foreign-film imports during the summer blockbuster season. For years, regulators have boosted local films by keeping Hollywood imports out of the market during most of July and August. This year, several Hollywood titles were allowed in — Paramount's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows on July 2, Warner Bros.' The Legend of Tarzan on July 19, and Universal's The Secret Life of Pets on Aug. 2.

Even more striking, in late fall, officials discreetly loosened their infamous quota on foreign film imports. Under the terms of a trade deal negotiated in 2012, foreign studios usually can release just 34 films in China each year (on revenue-sharing terms). But regulators were wiling to let this lever go rather than countenance the threat of a full-year decline. By mid-November it was clear that at least 38 foreign titles would be brought in, with Warner Bros.' Sully and 20th Century Fox's Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children scoring early December dates, along with Japan's anime smash hit Your Name. In past years, December was reserved as a local-movie-only blackout period.

A spokesperson for China's film bureau denied to local media that the quota had been breached, saying that the additional titles were "cultural exchange projects." Insiders describe this characterization as a face-saving exercise — however it was described, more movies were brought in.

Hollywood's year in China has been slightly rosier than the local industry's as a whole. The first half of 2016 seemed to spell trouble — imported films saw only 5 percent growth year-on-year. But thanks to the lighter hand taken by regulators, the second half has improved. Revenue from imported titles — most of which are U.S. studio films — is up 18.9 percent from July 1 to Dec. 15. Imported titles also have claimed 43.5 percent market share at the Chinese box office thus far (Jan. 1 to Dec. 15), up from 38.4 percent in 2015.

China's year-end box office total is usually released on Jan. 1. This year's tally will be met with less fanfare, and more scrutiny.

[GeneChing]

And here's the yang story:

At 40,917, China has more film screens than US (https://www.socialnews.xyz/2016/12/20/at-40917-china-has-more-film-screens-than-us/)
POSTED BY: GOPI DECEMBER 20, 2016

https://placeholdit.imgix.net/~text?txtsize=50&bg=ffffff&txtclr=dd0000&txt=At+40%2C917%2C+China+has+more+film+screens+tha n+US&w=720&h=360&fm=png

Beijing, Dec 20 (IANS) There are 40,917 film screens in Chinese theatres as of December 20, the country's film bureau said on Tuesday.

The film industry has seen huge growth, with 26 film screens on average added each day during 2016, Xinhua news agency cited the film bureau as saying.

At least 85 per cent of all new screens can play 3D movies.

The number of screens in the US market has been stable over the years, and stood at 40,759 by the end of May, America's National Association of Theater Owners said in a statement.

Accordingly, China has overtaken the US in terms of film screen numbers, the bureau said.

Box office sales in China, the world's second largest film market, have posted average growth of 35 per cent year on year since 2003.

China's 2016 box office sales are expected to exceed the 2015 total of 44 billion yuan ($6.4 billion).

[GeneChing]

At least my Chollywood Rising column title remains safe.


China Box Office Should Still Pass US Within 5 Years Despite Slump (http://www.chron.com/entertainment/the-wrap/article/China-Box-Office-Should-Still-Pass-US-Within-5-10811954.php)
Sheer numbers and an extraordinarily poor slate of summer films might mean 2016 was a blip on the radar
Matt Pressberg
Published 5:18 pm, Wednesday, December 21, 2016

http://ww2.hdnux.com/photos/56/05/43/12081369/3/920x920.jpg

Hollywood has been bracing for its seemingly imminent usurping as the world’s largest movie market by China, which was forecasted to come as soon as 2017. After a summer drought in the Middle Kingdom, Tinseltown isn’t going to have to hand off the baton just yet – but it will soon.
After growing a staggering 49 percent between 2014 and 2015 to $6.8 billion and continuing to surge in the first half of the year behind the country’s biggest movie ever, China’s yearly box office looks like it will finish essentially flat. That will keep it well behind the U.S. box office, which cleared $11 billion for the first time last year and sits at $10.7 billion as of Dec. 21, with Christmas season still to come.
While a major factor in China’s plateau has been the reduction of exceedingly generous online ticketing subsidies — you used to be able to see new films in Imax 3D for $5 or so — China’s film industry had an unseasonably ice cold summer, and probably won’t get that unlucky again.
That’s a major reason why Jonathan Papish, an industry analyst at China Film Insider, says he still expects China’s box office to surpass the U.S. in the near future.
“I think China will overtake North America within the next five years,” he told TheWrap.
Papish pointed out that this summer’s slump isn’t likely to repeat itself, and if it had one of last summer’s multiple summer hits it would have been a very different story.
“What we’ll likely see for the next few years or maybe even decade is some up years and some down years,” Papish said. “I think the key variable in this equation is the quality of films released in any given year. If this summer had another ‘Monster Hunt’ or ‘Jian Bing Man’ or even ‘Goodbye Mr. Loser,’ we’d have seen 30 to 35 percent growth in 2016.”
All three of those films (plus “Lost in Hong Kong”) were released between July and September 2015 and made at least $186 million in China, with “Monster Hunt” topping out at $382 million — just a hair behind “Furious 7,” China’s highest grossing movie of 2015, and at that point, all-time. China traditionally imposes an unofficial summer blackout period over much of July and August, clearing the field for local fare like “Monster Hunt” to do monster numbers.
But this year, after “The Mermaid” burst out of the gates in February to become the country’s top-grossing film ever with $527 million, Chinese cinema kind of ran out of gas. No other homegrown movie cleared the $200 million mark, and the highest-grossing summer movie was “Operation Mekong,” with $170 million.
And while a handful of imported films such as “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows” were allowed in during the summer, it’s not like they cannibalized Chinese films. “Warcraft,” a movie that made more than four times as much money in China than in the U.S., was the only Hollywood movie released over the summer that cracked the top 18 of the Chinese box office.
Hollywood knows better than any industry that nothing is a sure thing, not even growth in China. But Papish said he wouldn’t expect this year to be a trend as long as the release schedule has just a few more monsters.

[boxerbilly]

Well maybe if Hollywood made good films ( okay some are really good) they would not have to worry. If China makes better films. They win ! I guess we will know in 5 years or so. Thankfully lots of people have Netflix and are now instantly and easily exposed to other country films. I used to have to go to specific independent video stores for specific titles from other country's.

Hey does anyone know the title to a Chinese gangster film set in like 1920's about 3 brothers I believe ? I only saw the leader trailers on a vhs tape like 10-15 years back. I did not write down the title and never forgot I want to see that one.

Actually if you know of it and there is a trailer please put it up. I'll know if it is it once I see it.


This may be it but I recall a trailer showing more action-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9CmrxYp3GQ

[GeneChing]

...Why not? If it works for the U.S., why not the PRC?
Or do I have that backwards? :confused:


State media rails against film review websites for giving new Chinese movies poor marks (https://www.hongkongfp.com/2016/12/29/state-media-rails-film-review-websites-giving-new-chinese-movies-poor-marks/)
29 December 2016 14:00 AFP 3 min read

Chinese state media have taken popular online movie review sites to task for giving three new domestic blockbusters failing marks, accusing them of trying to undermine the domestic cinema industry by manipulating ratings.

Foreign films are in high demand at the world’s second-biggest box office, a fact that has long annoyed Beijing, which both covets Hollywood’s global reach and economic power and fears that it is exposing domestic audiences to pernicious “Western” thinking.

https://www.hongkongfp.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/POWERPNT_2016-12-29_18-49-07.jpg
The three Chinese blockbusters.

The number of overseas movies given releases each year is strictly limited, and an opinion piece on the smartphone app of the People’s Daily, the official mouthpiece of the Communist Party, said some influential commentators had made “malicious and irresponsible comments that seriously damaged” domestic films.

The piece, published Tuesday, questioned whether two Chinese film review websites — Douban and Maoyan — were manipulating domestic film ratings by giving them exceptionally low scores.

“Five-star” comments were deleted, while domestic films received thousands of “one-star” ratings even before their midnight premieres ended, state broadcaster CCTV alleged separately.

https://www.hongkongfp.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/POWERPNT_2016-12-29_18-49-33.jpg

Following the remarks, Maoyan cancelled part of its film ranking function.

Internet users, however, took the opportunity to write some reviews of their own, bombarding state media with snide remarks about the government’s terrible taste in movies and restrictive attitudes towards free speech.

“You won’t even let us say a movie is terrible,” one commenter said.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avF6GHyyk5c

Douban’s CEO, too, objected to the characterisation of the site, saying the reviews accurately effect audience opinion.

In response, the People’s Daily seemed to walk back its remarks Wednesday, saying the real reason for the bad ratings might simply be bad movies.

“Can films really be ruined by ‘one-star’ scores? Can the ecological environment of films really be affected by ‘negative comments’?” it asked.

The second article, not the first, reflects the official line, the paper added.

China’s annual box office reached 44.1 billion yuan ($6.34 billion) in 2015, with domestic films securing 61.9 percent of sales, according to China Movie Data Information Network.

In December, three domestic films battled for the country’s box office: “The Great Wall” directed by Zhang Yimou and starring Matt Damon, “Railroad Tigers” starring Jackie Chan, and “See You Tomorrow” produced by Wong Kar-wai.

https://www.hongkongfp.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/1467983829_5107.jpg
File photo: Apple Daily.

Ticket sales have been brisk, but audiences panned their poor acting and thin stories.

One common complaint is Chinese censors’ heavy-handed management of the creative process from script to theatre.

In November, the country passed legislation saying films should promote “socialist core values”, while avoiding the kind of themes — sex, violence and politics — that are a large part of Hollywood’s appeal.

Chinese companies have been ramping up investment in the foreign movie industry, but they often have to walk a thin line between balancing strict censorship at home and appealing to global audiences.

In January, Chinese conglomerate Wanda Group signed a $3.5 billion deal to buy Hollywood studio Legendary Entertainment, the company behind the “Batman” trilogy and “Jurassic World”, as well as “The Great Wall”.

[GeneChing]

2016 Hong Kong Box Office: Asian Cinema Cheered Despite 2% Drop (http://variety.com/2017/film/asia/hong-kong-box-office-annual-1201951276/)
Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/cold-war-2-e1465957003912.png?w=670&h=377&crop=1
Hong Kong Box Office: Asian Cinema
JANUARY 3, 2017 | 04:32AM PT

Theatrical box office in Hong Kong shrank a modest 2% in 2016. But with two local films and a runaway Korean hit in the top ten, there was reason for Asian film makers to cheer the performance.

Data from Hong Kong Box Office Ltd showed gross box office of US$252 million (HK$1.95 billion) compared with US$257 million (HK$1.99 billion) in 2015. The decrease came despite larger numbers of local and imported titles finding theatrical outings, a total of 348, compared with 332 in 2015. The number of Hong Kong films released last year grew to 61, up from 59 in 2015. The imports total rose from 273 in 2015 to 287 in 2016.

The record breaking winner was “Captain America: Civil War” with US$14.6 million (HK$113 million.) In second place, and breaking records for an Asian film in Hong Kong theaters was Korean zombie horror “Train to Busan” with a sensational US$8.77 million (HK$68.0 million.)

Breaking records for the top scoring local film, “Cold War 2” placed third on the overall chart with US$8.54 million (HK$66.2 million.) Also considered as a local title, Stephen Chow’s “The Mermaid” placed seventh with US$7.12 million (HK$55.2 million.)

The differences between the Hong Kong scores and the box office results for mainland China are as wide as ever. “The Mermaid” and “Zootopia” ranked first and second this year in China, but only seventh and eighth in Hong Kong. “Train to Busan” and “Deadpool,” which came sixth in Hong Kong, have not been allowed releases in the mainland.

China’s top ten included three other China-Hong Kong productions that did not feature in the Hong Kong top ten: “The Monkey King 2,” “The Man From Macau 3,” and “Operation Mekong.” Such scores are likely to fuel claims that the Hong Kong production industry is these days increasingly driven by mainland Chinese tastes, while Hong Kong audiences still generally favor Hollywood or local Hong Kong titles.

This is in contrast to the rest of China...

[GeneChing]

China Box-Office Growth Slowed to 3.7 Percent in 2016, Official Data Shows (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-growth-slows-37-percent-2016-official-data-shows-960217)
7:11 PM PST 1/1/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2016/02/themonkeyking22filmko_-_h_2016.jpg
Courtesy Filmko Pictures Co., Ltd
'The Monkey King 2'

Hollywood fared considerably better than the local industry, with revenue for imported films up 10.9 percent for the year.
China's once booming box office ended 2016 with a whimper.

After averaging yearly growth of 35 percent for more than a decade, China's movie ticket revenue expanded just 3.7 percent in 2016, clocking in at Ұ45.7 billion for the year, according to official data from China's State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television.

The Chinese currency weakened against the dollar throughout the year, meaning that 2016's total actually amounted to a decline in U.S. dollar terms. Total box-office revenue this year was $6.58 billion compared to $6.78 billion (Ұ44 billion) last year.

Growth of 3.7 percent would be considered a healthy number in many mature markets around the world — North America's box office grew 2.1 percent to hit $11.36 billion in 2016 — but for China, it represents a drastic deceleration from last year's 48 percent expansion rate.

The boom times continued at the start of 2016, with local blockbusters like Stephen Chow's The Mermaid, which earned $528 million in China alone, driving growth of over 50 percent in the first quarter. Many analysts then predicted that China would surpass North America to become the world's biggest theatrical market as early as 2017. But growth fell off a cliff in the second quarter — a 4.6 percent year-on-year decline, the territory's first such fall in half a decade — and it has yet to bounce back.

Hollywood studios fared slightly better in China in 2016. Imported international films — the vast majority of which are U.S. studio titles — accounted for 41.7 percent of total box office in 2016, compared to 38.4 percent revenue share in 2015. Overall, international movies earned $2.7 billion (Ұ19.06 billion) in China, compared to $2.6 billion (Ұ16.99 billion) last year, despite the less favorable exchange rates. Revenue was up 10.9 percent for the year.

The forces behind China's slowdown were a regular subject of debate — and hand-wringing — throughout the year. Most industry observers converge around a combination of factors: weaker local films, a crackdown on box-office fraud, cutbacks in last year's generous ticket subsidies from fast-growing online platforms, overall weakness in the Chinese economy and increased consumer discernment among China's new moviegoers (for a more detailed look at the causes of the slowdown, see here).

China's state-backed international radio station tried to put a positive spin on the slowdown in its English-language coverage of the SAPPRFT figures, saying, "the film industry in China kept a steady development momentum in 2016 amid the 'new normal' of the country's economic development" — a reference to China's slowing overall economy. The news source also said that China's film sector faced "multiple challenges, including the rapid development of the internet."

The SAPPRFT data shows that the number of movie tickets sold in China in 2016 was up slightly to 1.37 billion, an increase of about 8.9 percent year-on-year. The average ticket price was down, however, reflecting the expansion of cinema construction into provincial markets that are less economically developed.

China built 1,612 new cinemas this year, bringing its total to 41,179 screens. That was enough to top the U.S. total — 40,759 screens, according to the National Association of Theatre Owners — making China the country with the most cinemas in the world.

Anticipating a box office bump this month with CNY (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69980-2017-Year-of-the-Fire-Rooster).

[GeneChing]

$1B. That's what Rogue One (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68803-Star-Wars-Rogue-One) made as of last weekend.


Thu Jan 19, 2017 | 11:41pm EST
China extends Hollywood push with $1 billion Paramount investment (http://www.reuters.com/article/us-viacom-paramount-china-idUSKBN153335?utm_source=applenews)

http://s2.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20170119&t=2&i=1169403996&w=780&fh=&fw=&ll=&pl=&sq=&r=LYNXMPED0I1PD
A security guard speaks into a microphone in his sleeve as he stands outside the Viacom Inc. headquarters in New York April 30, 2013. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson/File Photo
By Jessica Toonkel | NEW YORK

Viacom Inc's Paramount Pictures will receive a $1 billion cash investment from two Chinese film companies, Shanghai Film Group (SFG) and Huahua Media, giving the U.S. studio much-needed cash and support as it attempts to grow.

As part of the agreement, SFG and Huahua Media will finance a combined 25 percent of all of Paramount's films for the next three years, with the option to extend to a fourth year, a source familiar with the situation said.

The deal comes as parent company Viacom focuses on a turnaround plan under new Chief Executive Officer Bob Bakish.

It also follows a spate of tie-ups between China and U.S. producers, with Chinese investors increasingly keen to lend their financial muscle to boost their stake in Hollywood.

U.S. studios such as Warner Bros, Walt Disney Co, Dreamworks, Lionsgate and STX Entertainment have all made tie-ups with Chinese firms to fund productions or help boost their presence in China's fast-growing film market.

Last year, Chinese real estate conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group spent $3.5 billion to buy a controlling stake in U.S. film studio Legendary Entertainment, while Paramount worked with Alibaba Pictures Group Ltd in 2015 to promote "Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation" in China.

The studio could now use the latest partnership as an entry point into China, Paramount CEO Brad Grey told Reuters in an interview, adding that the studio would someday be interested in producing films in the country.

"Certainly Paramount would love to produce films (in China) and we think that should be a win for us," Grey said.

The agreement marks the first major move by Grey since Viacom's former CEO, Philippe Dauman, tried to sell a 49 percent stake in the movie studio to Dalian Wanda last year.

"This will give Paramount the wherewithal to build the slate and produce, as a major studio should, 15-17 movies a year," Grey said. Over the past few years, under Dauman, Paramount's production fell as low as eight films in a given year.

"You really can't operate a major studio with that," Grey said, referring to the lower figure.

Shanghai Film Group and Huahua Media said in a joint statement with Paramount that they were keen to deepen their cooperation on film projects through the deal. Both firms declined to comment further when contacted by Reuters on Friday.

Huahua has partnered with Paramount on several films, including "Transformers: the Age of Extinction" and "Star Trek Beyond". State-linked Shanghai Film Group was an investor in "Jack Reacher: Never Go Back".

Viacom shares moved higher in Thursday afternoon trading but pared gains to close at $39.80.

(Reporting by Jessica Toonkel; Additional reporting by Tim Baysinger and Adam Jourdan; Editing by Bernard Orr and Christopher Cushing)

[GeneChing]

It's all about the world market now. We'll see how the populist attack on global trade affects the film industry and all other industries.


Sluggish China Box Office Brings Down 2016’s Global Totals (http://variety.com/2017/film/box-office/2016-global-box-office-1201968877/)
Brent Lang
Senior Film and Media Editor
@BrentALang

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/captain-american-civil-war-finding-dory-top-movies-at-box-office.jpg?w=670&h=377&crop=1
COURTESY OF DISNEY
JANUARY 25, 2017 | 10:00AM PT
Publicly, studio executives tend to be a rosy bunch, predicting that each year’s crop of movies will be better than that which preceded it. But behind closed doors, few in the business were expecting much from 2016.

This story first appeared in the January 24, 2017 issue of Variety. Subscribe today.

When the final numbers are tallied, the global box office will probably fall short of last year’s record-breaking $38.9 billion. Most observers expect ticket sales to fall roughly 2% to just over $38 billion. That decline is reason for some alarm, particularly as the shortfall is largely attributable to a slowdown in China. After years of explosive growth, in which returns were expanding at a 40% clip annually, revenue in China was essentially flat in 2016 — a disappointment for the world’s second-largest film market, which had been expected to surpass the U.S. in terms of revenue in a matter of months.

“As China goes, so goes the international marketplace,” notes Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at ComScore.

There are worries that Donald Trump’s presidency could have a further chilling effect. Trump has been a proponent of stricter tariffs on foreign goods and has often cast China as an adversary.

“Who knows what our trade policies will be like in a year?” Dergarabedian asks.

If Trump is true to his word, there could be some type of retaliation from China at a time when Hollywood is increasingly reliant on Chinese financing and viewership. In particular, there are concerns about a move toward tighter restrictions on the number of U.S. films that are allowed to screen in the country.

But many studio executives remain bullish on the long-term prospects of Sino-Tinseltown relations.

“In China, there has been a slowdown off a base of massive growth, but it’s still the biggest of the markets where we or any studio does business, and it will still be on pace to displace the U.S. in box office, though maybe not as quickly as people thought,” says Dave Hollis, Disney’s global distribution chief.

China aside, there is a sense that 2016 could have been worse. “Deadpool” and “Zootopia” were blockbusters that few saw coming. And while “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” and “Finding Dory” weren’t hits on the level of 2015 smashes such as “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” and “Jurassic World,” they resonated with global audiences.

“If you look at the slate last year, it played pretty well,” says Eric Handler, an analyst with MKM Partners. “The numbers would suggest there might be a modest decline in attendance, but the movie business is still holding in quite well.”

Across the globe, the story was one of slowdowns, stall-outs, and surges. Spain began to rebound after tough economic times, with ticket sales rising 5%, and France had its second-best performance in 50 years. Yet other major markets had problems: Revenue fell by double digits in Germany, and growth stalled in South Korea.

In some cases, the declines can be chalked up to weaker local product. In others, the studio blockbusters didn’t excite as they had in previous years. (Studios point to parts of Asia and Latin America as regions in which Hollywood products are still finding a warm reception.) There were also currency headaches; a strong U.S. dollar meant that Europe and Russia failed to contribute as much to the returns of major blockbusters as they once did.

Still, there is optimism, fueled by a look at the slate for 2017, which will see sequels to “Star Wars,” “Transformers,” “Guardians of the Galaxy,” “Pirates of the Caribbean,” “The Fast and the Furious,” “Despicable Me,” “Spider-Man,” and “Cars.” This Murderers’ Row has left analysts like Dergarabedian reaching for the perfect metaphor to encapsulate the moneymaking on the horizon.

“I call it the 100-year flood of movies,” he says.

[GeneChing]

Anticipating a box office bump this month with CNY (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69980-2017-Year-of-the-Fire-Rooster). Freakin' genius, right? Now if only I could predict something useful, like lottery numbers...


China Box Office Roars Back to Life as New Year Holiday Kicks Off (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-roars-back-life-as-new-year-holiday-kicks-969989)
7:56 PM PST 1/29/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn2.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/01/journeytothewest_trailer.jpg
Screengrab
'Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back'

As China's biggest moviegoing week of the year got underway, Stephen Chow's 'Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back' earned a massive $83.4 million in two days.

The Chinese New Year holiday brought the world's No. 2 box office roaring back to life over the weekend, as Stephen Chow's Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back pulled in $83.4 million over two days.

The seven-day holiday, kicking off Saturday, is usually China's hottest box-office stretch of the year. Demons Strike Back opened to $52.5 million Saturday, overtaking last year's Chinese New Year champion The Mermaid to set a new single-day record for a local film. Only Universal's Furious 7 — $68.8 million in 2015 — has earned more in one day in China.

Demons Strike Back is the sequel to Chow's 2013 hit Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons. Chow wrote and produced the follow-up but fellow Hong Kong hitmaker Tsui Hark took over as director. The fantasy-comedy franchise is based on a beloved work of classic Chinese literature. The film also made a muscular debut on Imax, taking $4.5 million from 390 screens Saturday, another single-day record for a Chinese release.

Two India-themed action-comedies also opened big, but a notch below Demons, as the holiday was getting underway. Buddies in India, directed by and starring comedy favorite Wang Baoqiang, debuted to $44 million, while Jackie Chan's China-India co-production Kung Fu Yoga kicked off with $38.5 million, according to weekend estimates from Beijing box-office tracker Ent Group. By Sunday, Chan's picture appeared to be pulling ahead, however, as better reviews and word of mouth spread. Buddies earned $27.6 million Saturday and $16.6 million Sunday, while Yoga took $20.2 million and $18.4, respectively. (All of the new releases opened Saturday, rather than the usual Friday, which fell on the eve of the holiday, when Chinese stay home to share traditional meals with their families, leaving cinemas all but empty.)

Coming in fourth place, 35-year-old blogger-turned-director Han Han brought some diversity to the frame with Duckweed, an adaptation of his novel about coming-of-age and father-son relationships in 1990s small-town China. The film stars Deng Chao as a Chinese youth who travels back in time — Back to the Future style — to experience interesting episodes from the life of his father, played by Eddie Peng, resolving some generational misunderstandings.

Boonie Bears: Entangled Worlds, the fourth installment in the hit local animation franchise, played to the family-with-little-kids crowd, opening to $17.4 million over Saturday and Sunday.

In 2016, China's box office raked in $548 million (3.56 billion yuan) over the CNY holiday — the highest one-week total ever achieved by a single territory. The huge start to the year had analysts predicting that China might surpass North America as the world's biggest movie market within a matter of months rather than years. But then a prolonged chill set in, resulting in average box- office growth of just 3.7 percent for the full year.

The big holiday bounce comes as considerable encouragement then. After two days, more than $200 million is in the till. By midweek, we should know whether a new one-week record is within reach.

Journey to the West 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?65681-Stephan-Chow-s-Journey-to-the-West-2-The-Demons-Strike-Back)
Buddies In India (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70041-Buddies-in-India)
Kung Fu Yoga (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68161-Kung-Fu-Yoga)

[GeneChing]

I saw
Kung Fu Yoga (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68161-Kung-Fu-Yoga) last night. I'll review it on that thread soon.


China Box Office: Stephen Chow, Jackie Chan Revive Growth for Record Holiday Haul (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-stephen-chow-jackie-chan-revive-growth-record-holiday-haul-971732)
9:03 PM PST 2/2/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/01/img_4851-h_2017.jpg
Courtesy of Edko Films
'Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back'

Total ticket sales over China's vital New Year holiday period are up 13 percent, with blockbusters from Chow and Chan leading the pack.
Veteran Hong Kong hitmakers Stephen Chow and Jackie Chan are the heroes of China's box office yet again.

The latest blockbuster releases from the two icons helped fuel 13 percent growth in ticket sales over China's week-long New Year holiday period. China's box office also recorded a 25 percent year-on-year gain in January — the market's first increase since August.

Chow's Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back set a single-day record of $52.5 million (354 million yuan) on Jan. 28, the first day of Chinese New Year. Over the following six days ending Feb. 2, total ticket revenue in China hit $485 million (3.34 billion yuan), compared to 2.96 billion yuan over the equivalent six-day holiday period last year, according to Beijing-based box office monitor EntGroup.

The strong numbers will come as welcome news to Hollywood and the Chinese industry alike, after months of downbeat indicators from the Middle Kingdom. Following years of double-digit expansion, China's theatrical market experienced a major correction last year, with revenue growth dropping to its slowest pace since 2008.

The uptick should probably come with an asterisk, however. On Jan. 28, China's regulators began including online service fees as part of box office grosses. Such fees are usually just 3-5 yuan per ticket ($.44 to $.73), but given that an estimated 70 percent of all movie tickets are now bought online in China, the adjustment amounts to a sizable accounting tweak. Regulators say the adjustment was necessary to reflect changes in consumer behavior, but the timing is conspicuous.

Analysts are mostly embracing the upswing though. "The strong holiday box office performance beat market expectations, and we believe it serves as a strong signal that box office revenue has bottomed,” HSBC's John Liu wrote in a note to clients Thursday, according to Bloomberg.

Demons Strike Back is the sequel to Chow's 2013 hit Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons. Chow wrote and produced the follow-up but fellow Hong Kong filmmaker Tsui Hark took over as director. After six days, the film has earned $167.6 million.

Jackie Chan's latest action-comedy vehicle, Kung Fu Yoga, opened in third place on Jan. 28 with $38.5 million. But a big embrace by both fans and critics has helped the film make a late-stage climb to the top of the charts. It pulled in $23.3 million on Wednesday and $22.1 million on Thursday, over Demons' $18.9 million and $17 million respective numbers. A big-budget India-China co-production, the film was directed by veteran Chan collaborator Stanley Tong. Its total now stands at $126.6 million.

China's film regulators block Hollywood imports during the lucrative CNY holiday stretch. Imported fare won't be back on Chinese screens until xXx: The Return of Xander Cage opens Feb. 10, followed by La La Land on Feb. 14, Valentine's Day.

Looking forward to seeing Journey to the West 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?65681-Stephan-Chow-s-Journey-to-the-West-2-The-Demons-Strike-Back) - it opens today in 3D IMAX.

[GeneChing]

China's Quota on Hollywood Film Imports Set to Expand, State Media Says (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/chinas-state-media-says-quota-hollywood-film-imports-will-expand-974224)
11:30 PM PST 2/9/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/01/china_tap_illo.jpg
Illustration by: Kevin Hong

After an "extremely cordial" call between President Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping, a government-backed news outlet projected an expansion to China's film quota and a greater share of box-office revenue for Hollywood studios.
China is expected to expand its quota on foreign film imports and allow Hollywood a greater share of box office revenue after government officials and industry representatives from China and the U.S. meet to renegotiate trade terms later this month, China's state media reported Friday.

The Global Times, an influential state-backed newspaper, predicted that a dozen more films will be added to the quota, citing local industry experts. The outlet also forecast that the share of box-office revenue that U.S. distributors are entitled to take will move from the current 25 percent towards the international average of 40 percent.

"Although it might not be as large as the previous 12 percentage points increase," Huang Guofeng, an analyst from Beijing-based consultancy Analysys International, allowed.

Known for its populist tone and pro-government slant, the Global Times occasionally is viewed as a bellwether for policy direction. The article also was carried in the English edition of the People's Daily, the official newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party.

The timing of the state-affiliated analysis could be significant, given that President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping spoke by telephone on Thursday. According to the White House, Trump offered Xi an affirmation of the "One China" policy, which has served as the basis of Sino-U.S. relations for a generation. Trump rattled the U.S.-China relationship in January by publicly questioning whether it was necessary to honor the policy. The call is believed to have smoothed relations considerably — at least temporarily. The White House described the conversation as "extremely cordial," and Xi is understood to have told Trump that China is willing to strengthen cooperation with the U.S. in several areas, including trade and investment.

China employs various means to protect its growing domestic film industry from Hollywood domination. The most notorious measure is the strict quota limiting the number of foreign movies allowed into the local market on revenue-sharing terms.

Under the current five-year deal, which was signed by former vice president Joe Biden and Chinese president Xi Jinping in February, 2012, China accepts 34 overseas films per year, with 14 of the titles required to be 3D or large-format movies.

The landmark 2012 agreement temporarily resolved a bitter trade dispute, which had involved Washington filing an official complaint with the World Trade Organization alleging that China unfairly restricted access to its market. Previously, China had allowed just 20 imported films and foreign distributors got only 13 percent of revenue.

Industry figures on both sides of the Pacific have been expecting liberalization to continue when the existing accord expires. At the World Economic Forum in Davos last month, consummate insider Li Ruigang, head of powerhouse investment firm China Media Capital, said he could see the quota jumping to as high as "50, 60 or even 70 U.S. films."

China's film regulators offered some encouraging hints of relaxation in late 2016. In an effort to counteract a downturn at the local box office, regulators packed the December release schedule with additional Hollywood films, bringing the year's total to 39 imported titles instead of 34. Regulators classified the extra releases as special "cultural exchange projects," denying that the usual limit had been breached — but most analysts viewed the move as a modest de facto expansion of the quota.


It's all about the world market now. We'll see how the populist attack on global trade affects the film industry and all other industries.
Once again, we could all see this coming to some degree. And I'm still wishing these predictive skills would've been lottery numbers.

[GeneChing]

Can China Save the Struggling European Art House? (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/can-china-save-struggling-european-art-house-973988)
10:00 PM PST 2/9/2017 by Patrick Brzeski , Scott Roxborough

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2014/01/liao_fan_and_gwei_lun_mei.jpg
Courtesy of Fortissimo
'Black Coal, Thin Ice'

As the global market for specialty titles shrinks, Euro producers are increasingly eyeing access to the Middle Kingdom. Says one insider: "It will be the biggest market anywhere."
When Chinese neo-noir Black Coal, Thin Ice won the Berlin Film Festival’s Golden Bear in 2014, the global art house community got a glimpse of a tantalizing future soon to come. The gritty indie, directed by Diao Yinan, grossed $16.5 million upon its release in mainland China following the festival — a total previously inconceivable for an art house title in the Middle Kingdom’s unabashedly commercial theatrical market.

Since then, the development of the Chinese indie sector has only accelerated, as emerging Chinese talents and European art house veterans have come to view cross-border collaboration as the key to a vibrant shared future.

"The population in China is so huge, even if we get a very small slice, it will be the biggest art house market anywhere," says Yang Cheng, producer of two Chinese films showing in Berlin this year, competition title Have a Nice Day and Ghost in the Mountains, screening in the Panorama sidebar.

The global art house sector has seen its share of struggles recently. Just before the Toronto Film Festival, the twin bankruptcy filings of Fortissimo Films and U.K. distributor Metrodome Group cast a shadow over the indie film industry. The rise of streaming services like Netflix and Amazon have decimated the DVD sales that were the backbone of their business. But the ascension of the Chinese market could present a lifeline.

In November, the Chinese government threw support behind art cinema with the establishment of the National Arthouse Film Alliance, an indie film circuit managed by the China Film Archive, with support from commercial cinema chains. Eventually, the circuit plans to show a mix of low-budget Chinese films and imported art house fare. Once government film import arrangements have been ironed out, the organization should offer international art house auteurs an avenue for participating in the historic rise of the Chinese film market, which until now mostly has benefited Chinese and Hollywood blockbusters.

“There are just 100 screens in the project so far, so there’s not that much money in it yet — but it’s a very promising start,” says Gao Yitian, producer of The Villain, an edgy indie mystery directed by Xin Youku.

China’s streaming giants also are beginning to show an appetite for indie fare. Zhang Dalei’s The Summer Is Gone, which won the best picture award at the Taipei Golden Horse awards late last year, recently was acquired by SVOD powerhouse iQiyi for a healthy $400,000.

While censorship remains a challenge, the government covets the cultural cache of awards overseas — which makes recognition from Europe’s historic film festivals vital to directors hoping to break through.

“Participation in festivals is very important to getting attention,” says Gao. “If you win an award, your film will be everywhere in the Chinese media.”

Hollywood and European film veterans increasingly are investing in Sino-European ties. Last August, international film and TV studio IM Global launched a new venture designed to help Chinese producers and financiers gain international exposure for their projects at overseas festivals. Named Go Global, the business also is shopping its services from the opposite direction, offering representation to Western festival directors who would like to gain a foothold in China's diversifying market. European association Bridging the Dragon also is developing projects suitable for co-production with China, while cultivating a community of Sino-European film producers. The group will hold its third annual panel discussion series in Berlin on Feb. 15.

The Chinese-European future of the art house is perhaps nowhere so striking as in the fate of Dutch sales outfit Fortissimo Films. A pioneer in bridging the European and Asian markets, the company was renowned for introducing the work of Asian auteurs such as Wong Kar Wai and Park Chan-wook to European audiences.

Sources in Berlin tell THR that China's Hehe Pictures Corporation, which co-financed and released Chinese mega hit The Mermaid, is now circling the insolvent sales group. Pending Chinese government approval, Hehe hopes to acquire and relaunch Fortissimo ahead of Cannes this year. The new Fortissimo is understood to already be scouting for senior sales and acquisitions executives and will be looking to expand into production. If the deal goes through, it will be the first direct investment by a Chinese media company into the European arthouse business.

***

5 Standout Chinese Art House Titles in the Berlin Lineup

http://cdn3.thr.com/sites/default/files/2017/02/have_a_nice_day_ghost_in_the_mountains_ciao_ciao_i nmates_and_the_foolish_bird_split.jpg
Courtesy of Berlinale
Have a Nice Day, Ghost in the Mountains, Ciao Ciao, Inmates and The Foolish Bird
Have a Nice Day

Liu Jian’s story about a bag of money and the conflict it causes is China’s first animated Berlin competition title.

Ghost in the Mountains
The Panorama section film, by Yang Heng, sees a man return to his rural hometown.

Ciao Ciao
A woman goes from a big city to visit her parents in a small town in this Panorama entry from Song Chuan.

Inmates
Ma Li’s doc about a psychiatric clinic in Northern China will unspool in the festival’s Forum sidebar.

The Foolish Bird
Huang Ji and Ryuji Otsuka’s Generation 14+ film focuses on the challenges of a teenage girl in today’s China.



Okay, this one I didn't see coming. But I should have. It makes sense given the elements in play now.

[GeneChing]

U.S. and China Struggle Over Film Quotas (http://variety.com/2017/biz/asia/u-s-and-china-struggle-over-film-quotas-1201979720/)
Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/xi-jinping.jpg?w=670&h=377&crop=1
DENIS BALIBOUSE/POOL/EPA/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK
FEBRUARY 9, 2017 | 10:00PM PT

The renegotiation of the trade agreement could not come at a more sensitive time

As the U.S. and China begin to renegotiate the formal agreement that will determine relations between the two countries’ film industries, the talks couldn’t come at a more sensitive time.

Xi Jinping, party chairman and president of the People’s Republic of China, now leads a confident and expansionist country, while newly seated U.S. President Trump is looking inward and questioning many aspects of legacy trade policy.

Just before Trump killed off predecessor Barack Obama’s Trans-Pacific Partnership, Xi was stealing the limelight at the Davos conference in Switzerland and extolling the benefits of globalization.

The film renegotiations take place once every five years, and are scheduled to begin this month just after the expiration of the present bilateral agreement. They will certainly be different this time around, and their outcome will shape relations between the two superpowers’ film industries.

And while the movie industry’s cross-border financial flows are small compared with those of other business sectors, movies are highly visible, symbolic, and politicized.

The last round reached agreement in 2012 when the two countries’ (then) vice presidents, Xi and Joe Biden, crunched out a handshake deal before a basketball game. It then took lawyers fully three years to turn that into a contract, which had less than two years left to run.

That bilateral agreement expires imminently — in mid-February. Negotiations can begin after that. The only certainty is that they will be different from last time.

“A few months ago we might have assumed a continuation of the Biden approach, but now the process is full of uncertainties,” says Tom Ara, partner at U.S. law firm Greenberg Traurig and board member of the U.S.-Asia Institute.

Moreover, China’s history-making box office growth since 2012 requires a recalibration of the calculations. From $2 billion in 2011, the market had more than tripled to $6.4 billion in 2015. That has the effect of making the two industries far more co-dependent.

China is now by far the biggest single export market for U.S. films, while Hollywood blockbusters underpin the massive expansion of Chinese multiplexes (and the share price of recently listed China Film Co.).

Also, after a period of aggressive deal-making, Chinese capital is involved at multiple stages of the Hollywood studio system — corporate equity, slate finance, and marketing alliances.

Yet for all its growth, China’s film industry is still less developed than the mature markets of Europe or some others in Asia. China’s ancillary markets are growing, but their value is a small part of global entertainment trade. And the degree of state involvement in Chinese film remains unusually high. It includes state-owned operating companies, censorship, and government controls over the release dates of imported movies.

“We hope that the result of the U.S.-China trade talks will be reciprocally beneficial.”
JAMES WANG

The U.S. trade representative will be responsible for articulating the American position. Uncertainties here include the strategy of incoming USTR head Robert Lighthizer, a vehement China critic from the Reagan era, and Peter Navarro, Trump’s pick to head a new National Trade Council, who has authored “Death by China.”

The USTR is advised by the Motion Picture Assn. of America and the Independent Film and Television Alliance, which in turn have different agendas.

MPAA’s six Hollywood studios want more of three things.

The first is for more revenue-sharing movies to be allowed to enter China. There are 34, comprising 20 regular titles and 14 in the Imax or 3D format.

The second is that the share of revenue payable to foreign-rights holders increase from the current 25% of gross box office, which is very low by world standards. This would significantly boost what the U.S. studios earn from China.

The third is better access to China’s market.

IFTA, for its part, wants any increase in revenue-sharing quota films not to lead to an equivalent reduction of flat-fee import payments, which are what IFTA members’ films mostly obtain when they sell to China.

It also wants more players in the distribution sector — China Film Co. controls digital print keys even when a film is released by a private-sector distributor — and it wants far greater access for independent films to China’s streaming, TV, and other developing market segments. continued next post

[GeneChing]

Where the two lobby groups most closely overlap is in their desire to see China move closer to becoming a normal market.

Yet that is where they confront a Chinese negotiator who is likely to argue that the market is still immature and needs protection. While Zhang Hongsen, a senior spokesman at SARFT — the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television — has already told the local industry to get ready for more “intensive and fair competition” from 2018 onward, the Chinese government is unlikely to give much ground on film ratings and classification, or regulators having final say over import choices and release dates.

It seems equally unlikely that Chinese regulators will want to relax their unwritten and unofficial policy of market manipulation that ensures Chinese-qualifying films (including co-productions from Hong Kong, or those with American partners, such as “Kung Fu Panda 3”) account for 60% box office share. They managed 58.3% in 2016.

“[China] could easily expand the quotas, but then use other methods such as censorship, or unfavorable release dates, to ensure that there is no change to market share,” a source close to the U.S. delegation says.

One area of possible change could be the path to market access. While China is unlikely to allow Hollywood studios to own their own Chinese distribution companies, it could allow more local entities to handle the imported titles.

If the Hollywood studios could choose their own local distributor, rather than be obliged to sub-contract through the state duopoly of CFC and Huaxia, they would see that as an opportunity to introduce competition and develop expertise. Potential distributors exist in both the public and private sectors.

To some extent this reflects the successful development of the Chinese industry behind its trade barriers. China now has home-grown corporate champions, including Wanda, Alibaba, and Huayi Bros. They are eminently capable of releasing foreign titles, and are lobbying the Chinese government to be allowed to do so.

“China’s film market is getting more open to foreign players. … We hope that the result of the U.S.-China trade talks will be reciprocally beneficial,” says James Wang, co-chief of Huayi Bros. Media, which is a partner of budding Hollywood studio STX Entertainment.

“In recent years, Chinese firms are proactively going out, seeking multiple ways of cooperation with U.S. counterparts. We take globalization as an important way of learning and growing. Our vision is to tell Chinese stories to the global audience.”

Attitudes such as Wang’s point to the two industries finding common ground, but two huge unknowns now haunt the film trade talks: the implications of 2016’s abrupt slowdown in the Chinese box office, and the arrival of an unpredictable U.S. president.

After a record-breaking Chinese New Year season in 2016, China’s box office hit the skids in May, and the succeeding weak months meant that annual revenues grew by only 4%, proving wrong those who had predicted China grosses would imminently overtake those in North America. Where China did catch up was by opening nearly 10,000 screens to hit a 40,000 total.

The ostensible cause of the box office drop was a reduction in subsidies by online ticketing firms, but other factors, including a weak crop of Chinese films, may have been at play. Many in the industry promised to heed the lessons.

But in the meantime, government regulators quietly shortened “blackout periods” and allowed the import of some 40 Hollywood titles on revenue terms, without acknowledging that they had deviated from past practice. “Perhaps that is the best way forward for both sides. Let China open up on its own terms, but don’t highlight it. Don’t be seen to antagonize,” say Asian public affairs sources at one of the Hollywood majors.

The question as to whether the Trump administration is capable of or interested in such subtlety is now keeping several industry observers awake at night.

“Logically, we don’t expect the quotas to shrink. Trump would surely prefer a free market in movies in China. From an American point of view the more exports the better,” says the public affairs exec. “Trump is more concerned by imports into the U.S. [which in film are negligible], and there is congressional concern over Chinese buying companies in the States.”

But like many others, he fears that film industry negotiations could be contaminated by other areas of contention in the U.S.-China relationship. “If Trump does something silly, China would not hesitate to put politics over commerce,” says the lobbyist.

Such “silly” measures could include the imposition of tariffs on other industries such as steel, the stirring up of territorial disputes in the South China Sea, or — one of Trump’s campaign promises — to label China a currency manipulator.

With Xi seeking to further centralize the reins of power around himself in a year when the Communist Party renews its leadership, this is a particularly sensitive time.

There's also an interesting WSJ report (https://www.wsj.com/articles/hollywood-readies-to-renegotiate-terms-of-doing-business-in-china-1486572613) but it's copy protected at the moment.

[GeneChing]

Woah, I didn't know this is what the Iron Man experience is about. :p


Hollywood's obsession with China is just getting started — here's why (http://www.businessinsider.com/hollywood-made-in-china-excerpt-2017-1)
Aynne Kokas

http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/58a202283149a1b6008b69eb-1917/screen%20shot%202017-02-13%20at%2015747%20pm.png
The Iron Man Experience opened at Hong Kong Disney in January, 2017. Getty Images

With China’s box office on track to overtake America’s any year now, Hollywood is increasingly focused on Chinese audiences and Beijing censors. Aynne Kokas, author of "Hollywood in China," explains what we have in store.

As China’s media market grows, foreign media companies will increasingly need to consider the Chinese market first when developing content.

The power of the Chinese market is such that Hollywood producers will ignore the interests of Chinese audiences and regulators at great financial risk. “Made in China” will be a marketing strategy rather than a way to cut costs. If the market continues to grow, rather than simply being made in China, new productions will increasingly be made for China.

Greater focus on the Chinese market in the development process will likely mean more China-related content for global audiences. The upside of Hollywood producing content for China is that it may diversify the type of stories that Hollywood studios produce, as well as the types of people represented on the screen. Yet greater focus on the Chinese market also may privilege content that is more likely to be accepted by Chinese regulators. As a result, Hollywood’s accommodation of the Chinese market could substantially shift the type of media produced—not only for China, but also for other global markets.

Compounding this trend, Chinese outbound capital has begun to have substantial influence in Hollywood. Hollywood is increasingly a destination for media investment by Chinese companies in individual projects, in US-based offices, and even entire studios.

Alibaba reportedly invested in the 2015 Hollywood film "Mission: Impossible—Rogue Nation." The China Film Group has been linked as an investor to the record-breaking "Furious 7" movie. Chinese entertainment and technology firm LeTV established its US offices in Los Angeles in 2015. In April 2015, Chinese film studio Huayi Bros. made an agreement with American motion picture company STX entertainment to co-produce and co-distribute 12 to 15 films. In January 2016, the Dalian Wanda Group acquired American studio Legendary Pictures, making it the first Chinese firm to own a Hollywood studio.

Rather than made in China, Hollywood studio productions will also increasingly be made by China—or rather, by Chinese companies investing in Hollywood.

http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/579f6bbd4321f171088bc0fe-931
"The Great Wall" (2017) starring Matt Damon was the biggest Hollywood-China coproduction ever. Universal

If China’s outbound investment in Hollywood increases, the Chinese government will have less need to accommodate Hollywood capital and technical investment in China. As more distribution moves to networked digital platforms, the incentive structure for Chinese collaborations with Hollywood is likely to shift from collaboration to competition. The increasing role of digital platforms in media distribution is poised to diminish the potential impact American companies can have within Chinese media markets.

Chinese media investment in the United States, by contrast, shows no signs of slowing down.

Depending on its scope, Chinese FDI could reshape our understanding of the global cultural dominance of the US motion picture industry, radically expanding what cultural critic Rey Chow termed Chinese cinema’s “becoming-visible” to global audiences.

As I have argued, Hollywood’s relationship with China has already begun to leave a substantial global footprint as the result of collaborations on big-budget film releases and record-breaking shared theme park and studio investment. The Chinese Dream and the Hollywood dream factory are becoming ever-more entwined as Chinese media firms expand outward into the United States, and as the media and technology sectors continue to converge. But China and Hollywood remain in competition for global dominance—much as the United States and the PRC compete in the diplomatic realm.

In parallel, as Chinese content regulations become more significant to international media production, global commercial media culture may become subject to more demanding content restrictions to which foreign producers may voluntarily agree because of their desire for access to the Chinese market.

Collaborations advancing the Hollywood dream factory and the China dream may also crowd out content from other locales or in less commercial forms, thereby limiting rather than expanding the types of entertainment available to the global public.

Although seemingly awash with an air of inevitability, Hollywood-China collaboration remains unpredictable. Regardless of the ultimate outcome, visual spectacles in the form of red-carpet events, theme parks, and blockbusters are poised to become only more dramatic as Hollywood and China negotiate their global media brands.

[GeneChing]

FROM ‘IRON MAN’ TO ‘STAR WARS,’ HOW HOLLYWOOD CASHES IN ON CHINA’S BOX OFFICE (https://news.virginia.edu/content/iron-man-star-wars-how-hollywood-cashes-chinas-box-office)

https://news.virginia.edu/sites/default/files/styles/uva_basic_article/public/article_image/aynne_kokas_10hr_da_header.jpg?itok=0euYcBrZ
Aynne Kokas is an assistant professor of media studies. She has a new book that explains how Hollywood works in China. (Photo: Dan Addison, University Communications)

February 15, 2017 Jane Kelly, jak4g@virginia.edu

In 1999, Aynne Kokas was an undergraduate student living in a film studio in Beijing that housed not only the studio, but a film academy and student dorms. There, she witnessed some early Sino-U.S. movie collaborations – an experience that eventually led her to become a leading expert in the field of Hollywood’s relations with China.

Now an assistant professor of media studies at the University of Virginia, Kokas has written a new book, “Hollywood Made in China,” an examination of that growing relationship and what it means for media in both countries.

On Wednesday, Kokas joined UVA Today on Facebook Live to discuss the inner workings of China’s film quota system and how Hollywood is trying to gain entry to the country, whose film market is the second-largest in the world and rapidly gaining on the country in first place, the United States.

Q. “The Great Wall,” starring Matt Damon, just came out. With a budget of more than $150 million, the film is the largest-ever U.S.-China co-production and the most expensive film ever shot entirely in China. How do films like that get created and brought to market?

A. One of the things that’s really interesting is the incentive structure. There is currently a 34-film export quota to China. So only 34 foreign films can be exported to the market. This number sometimes shifts, but what this essentially means is that Hollywood studios have a limited number of chances to get their films into the Chinese market.

This is important because China’s market is the second-largest in the world. It was valued at $6.8 billion last year, and from 2011 to 2015 the market grew at 30 percent per year. Some estimates had China’s market overtaking the U.S. in 2017. China’s market actually grew a lot more slowly last year, but we are still seeing the possibility that it will catch up within the next five years.

Making a co-production [like “The Great Wall”] is actually a way to circumvent that 34-film quota. It gives Hollywood studios or big investors in the U.S. a chance to actually enter the Chinese market beyond the quota. So it’s treated like a local film in China and a local film in the U.S.

Q. How does Hollywood tailor movies to meet the requirements of China’s quota system?

A. There is an interesting path through which Hollywood studio films have to walk in order to enter the Chinese market. First of all, they have to be approved by [China’s] State Administration of the Press Publication, Radio, Film and Television. They are extremely powerful. Unlike in the U.S., where it is typically the production company or the producer or the director that has final cut approval, in this case, the Chinese regulatory agency has final approval over what can actually be distributed in the Chinese market. So it is a huge shift in the balance of power.

We also see some changes in content, so Hollywood studios are taking deliberate action to make their films more appealing for the Chinese market. So a film like “Iron Man 3” cast Chinese actors. We also saw the most recent “Star Wars” film, “Rogue One,” also cast major Chinese actors in order to act as a lure for the Chinese market. “Transformers 4” was shot in Hong Kong, and the Chinese minster of defense [character] was the only major competent government official in the entire film. [Director] Michael Bay’s next film after “Transformers 4” is actually a near-future dystopia in which China calls in the U.S. treasury debt and takes over the U.S.

So there are some interesting ways in which these narratives are starting to shift in such a way that it more favorably or more powerfully portrays the Chinese government.

Q. Are there sometimes two versions of a film, one for the United States market and another for China’s?

A. Absolutely. Some films have historically had 10 or 15 additional minutes. For example, “Iron Man 3” had 10 additional minutes of footage that was shown in the Chinese version that included more of the Chinese actors.

However, that model has been relatively ineffective because Chinese “Netizens,” or the very active Internet population in China, are kind of offended by that level of pandering. So in some ways it actually negatively affects the box office of the film.

Q. How is movie consumption in the United States different from that in China?

A. It’s a centerpiece of the weekend experience [in China], so people frequently take their families. Movie-going in the U.S. has become slightly less popular than China, especially up through 2016, when it was growing as a social activity for [Chinese] families.

The new theaters in China are equivalent to the highest of the high-end movie theaters in the U.S. There are extremely high ticket prices, $20, $25 or $30. There is a lot of digital capacity for IMAX or 3-D because these are really new theaters. China actually has more theatrical capacity, so more seats that people can sit in and watch a movie, than the U.S. does, which is a radical change from seven years ago. They have been increasing their theatrical distribution capacity year-over-year.

Q. Can you describe your new book, “Hollywood Made in China?”

A. I look at what it means that there is this new age of collaboration between China and Hollywood. We have never seen anything like this before.

Typically, when Hollywood studios went abroad, it would be to film something and then get out – this idea of run-away production. Maybe you shoot something in France or maybe you shoot something in Italy or maybe you shoot something in Vietnam or in Canada. But it’s really just a way to have a cost benefit and maybe get some local color.

But given the regulatory structure of the Chinese film market, it’s impossible to do that. So the level of engagement that Hollywood studios have to have with Chinese government entities is extremely high.

The part that’s even more interesting about this is that this is actually part of several, larger Chinese government policies. One is the “going out policy,” which is this idea of enhancing China’s profile abroad. The other is this idea of “soft power,” or cultural security; essentially using culture as a way to enhance China’s global power.

The final way is this idea of telling Chinese stories to enhance and improve sympathy for the Chinese government abroad. So, in order to access the Chinese market, a lot of Hollywood studios are actually advancing Chinese policy goals.

Looks like a good read, although I might have been able to write this book by just cobbling together the facts from this thread. ;)

[GeneChing]

It's Official: China's Recon Group Acquires 51 Percent of Millennium Films for $100M (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/chinas-recon-group-acquires-51-percent-millennium-films-official-978969)
7:20 AM PST 2/23/2017 by Ashley Lee

http://cdn2.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2016/04/gettyimages-521716704.jpg
Getty Images
Avi Lerner and Gerard Butler

The Chinese conglomerate takes a majority stake in Avi Lerner and Trevor Short's production company.

Recon Group is officially in business with Avi Lerner's Millennium Films.

The Chinese conglomerate unveiled Thursday an agreement to acquire a majority stake in Lerner's independent film production company, which is behind the Expendables franchise and genre flicks such as Rambo and London Has Fallen. The 51 percent stake is valued at $100 million, and the deal is set to close in the second quarter of the year.

Founded in 1996 by Lerner and Trevor Short, Los Angeles-based Millennium Films has been courting potential Chinese buyers for the past year, sources in Beijing have told THR. The company’s upcoming film slate includes The Hitman’s Bodyguard, starring Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson; Escobar, starring Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz; and Hunter Killer, starring Gerard Butler and Gary Oldman.

Under the terms of the deal, Recon Holding will acquire a majority interest in Millennium Films, including its nearly 300-film library. Lerner will act as CEO of Millennium Films, while Trevor Short will serve as COO. Xia, chairman of Recon Group and English soccer club Aston Villa, will serve as chairman of Millennium Films. Recon Holding will have the opportunity to acquire the remaining 49 percent stake in the future.

“We are excited about our new partnership with Recon Holding, led by Tony,” said Lerner and Short in a statement. “China is emerging as the world’s largest market for premium filmed entertainment, and we see enormous value in placing the Chinese market at the forefront of our global strategy. Our films have experienced considerable success in China and in other markets around the world, and we feel there is significant value in partnering with an astute, experienced and well-connected partner to help us execute our long-term strategy of making commercial movies for the global marketplace.”

“Since Avi and his partners founded the company, the Millennium Films organization has created a dynamic film brand and a deep library of intellectual property that resonates with audiences on a global scale,” said Xia in a statement. “We believe Millennium’s unparalleled portfolio of motion picture franchises and intellectual property provides significant opportunities for long-term growth as the company continues to maximize the value of its creative properties across multiple platforms and in multiple territories. This is an incredible opportunity for us to build upon Millennium’s premium brand by accessing a film market in China that continues to experience a period of unprecedented growth.”

Millennium Films was advised by The Raine Group and Latham & Watkins LLP. Amir Malin of Qualia Capital also provided advice and counsel. Recon Holding was advised by China International Capital Corporation and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP.


Maybe Expendables 4 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?67954-Expendables-4) needs Donnie Yen like xXx (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69211-xXx-The-Return-of-Xander-Cage&p=1300159#post1300159).

[GeneChing]

Hollywood is getting a lot of unexpected twists lately. :rolleyes:


Hollywood is left hanging as China reins in investments (http://www.business-standard.com/article/international/hollywood-is-left-hanging-as-china-reins-in-investments-117022700066_1.html)
Deals stall amid capital curbs, including one that would have put MGM under Chinese control
Alistair Barr & Mark Bergen | WSJ
February 27, 2017 Last Updated at 02:51 IST

http://bsmedia.business-standard.com/_media/bs/img/article/2016-09/20/full/1474378054-9219.jpg
Wang Jianlin, chairman of the Wanda Group

China’s crackdown on overseas investment is hitting Hollywood, torpedoing a deal that would have put Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios under Chinese control and placing other high-profile acquisitions in limbo.

Talks broke down between MGM and several Chinese companies late last year, an apparent casualty of China’s move to stanch capital outflows that has stalled the country’s shopping spree in Hollywood, according to people familiar with the matter.

The change comes after years of Chinese companies striking large deals, including the $3.5 billion acquisition of Legendary Entertainment in 2016 and a $1 billion film-financing infusion for Paramount Pictures last month.

An MGM sale would have been among the biggest-ticket and highest-profile such acquisitions, but its failure to materialize is evidence of a twist ending that few in Hollywood expected.

Beijing’s capital-control policy, which began in November, has kept deals such as the $1 billion acquisition of Dick Clark Productions by real-estate conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group Co. from closing, according to people familiar with the matter, and scuttled the takeover of smaller production companies.

The new dynamic highlights Hollywood’s dependence on China, where the slightest change in state policy has ripple effects across the entertainment industry. China’s deep pockets have become a frequent topic of speculation and intrigue among entertainment executives, some of whom see the country as full of prospective buyers willing to pay high premiums for flashy Hollywood holdings.

The economic-policy changes in China come amid mounting protectionist rhetoric in the U.S. from the administration of President Donald Trump.“We’ve heard from both [private-equity] firms and investment banks that China investment activity around [Hollywood] assets started to wane just prior to the election and is almost nonexistent now,” said Chris Fenton, a trustee of the U.S.-Asia Institute, which organizes congressional delegations to China, and president of DMG Entertainment, a media company headquartered in Beverly Hills and Beijing. “No China entity wants to be the first to test” the heated rhetoric on the U.S. side and the capital controls on the Chinese side, he added.

An MGM spokeswoman said: “MGM is in the strongest position ever and is not for sale.”Once known for producing classics of Hollywood’s Golden Age such as “The Wizard of Oz” and “Singin’ in the Rain,” MGM is now much smaller, owned by private-equity firms and long considered a likely takeover target. The studio’s most valuable asset is its film library, which includes several thousand titles, including co-ownership of numerous James Bond films.

Interest in MGM from China heated up last year when Viacom Inc.’s Paramount Pictures considered a rich acquisition offer from Wanda, according to a person familiar with the matter.

MGM wasn’t the subject of a formal auction process, according to a different person familiar with the matter, and has indicated to potential business partners that it may pursue a public stock offering in the next couple of years.

Chinese companies last year announced a record $225 billion in international purchases. Beijing keeps tight controls on money flowing out of the nation, concerned such capital flight could shake confidence in its economy and potentially weaken the yuan. That has led to greater scrutiny of overseas acquisitions to ensure they aren’t being made to evade capital controls.

Chinese companies that want to invest internationally typically submit applications to at least two regulators: the Ministry of Commerce and the National Development and Reform Commission, the country’s top economic planner. Once those applications are approved, the decision moves to a third regulator, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange. Regulators are still accepting applications, a person involved in Chinese outbound media deals said, but some applications appear to be in limbo and haven’t received a formal response, which has ground deals to a virtual halt.

In recent years, China has become a go-to source of capital for Hollywood. Studios have co-financed productions with Chinese firms and raked in billions in ticket sales in the country, now the world’s No. 2 box-office market.

But to some extent any deal with China represents a roll of the dice, said one longtime Hollywood executive. In the U.S., it is relatively easy to predict what might trip up government regulators, but in China there is little transparency about the state’s concerns.

“You have no way to assess what they might say about a deal,” the executive said.

In December, Chinese metals manufacturer Anhui Xinke New Materials Co. said it was canceling its roughly $350 million acquisition of Voltage Pictures LLC, a Los Angeles film financing and production company best known for “The Hurt Locker” and “Dallas Buyers Club.”

“They were really close to the end of the deal,” said a person close to Voltage. “Suddenly, the deal’s off and they never really got any clear communication from Xinke as to why.”

Voltage is suing Xinke and the Chinese company’s law firm for breach of contract, seeking more than $300 million in damages. Xinke has said in regulatory filings to the Shanghai Stock Exchange that Voltage didn’t provide additional information requested by that regulator. Xinke didn’t return calls or an email seeking comment.

On Thursday, China-based Recon Holding announced it would pay $100 million for a 51% stake in Millennium Films of Los Angeles, which produces “The Expendables” and “Olympus Has Fallen” franchises, and has a library of nearly 300 films. A person close to the deal said the crackdown made Recon more sensitive to regulatory concerns, adding that Chinese support for the transaction was helped by the fact that Millennium films have performed well in Chinese theaters. Wanda’s purchase of Dick Clark Productions, producer of the Golden Globes and other awards shows, was announced in November, but it is in limbo, according to people familiar with the matter. Dick Clark’s current owner, Eldridge Industries, still expects the deal to close, according to a person close to the company.

Wanda has had little trouble in the past getting money out of China for such deals. It paid $3.5 billion in early 2016 for Legendary Entertainment, which produced “The Great Wall,” and its AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. theatrical chain has acquired several other exhibitors around the world in recent years. Wang Jianlin, Wanda’s chairman and China’s richest man, has repeatedly said he wants to own a major Hollywood studio.

[GeneChing]

China’s Box Office Flat in First Two Months of 2017 (http://variety.com/2017/film/asia/chinas-box-office-flat-in-first-two-months-2017-1201999814/)
Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

http://i0.wp.com/pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/kung-fu-yoga-jackie-chan.jpeg?crop=0px%2C10px%2C1000px%2C557px&resize=670%2C377&ssl=1
COURTESY OF TAIHE ENTERTAINMENT, SHINEWORK PICTURES
MARCH 1, 2017 | 07:26AM PT

Theatrical box office in China edged ahead by 1% in the first two months of the year to $1.57 billion (RMB10.9 billion). After a dramatic slowdown in the second half of 2016, the figures will come as a relief to many in the Chinese industry if they prove to be a floor.

But distorting the comparison is a new methodology. Since Jan. 1, gross figures include the booking fees charged by online ticketing agencies. Subtract those fees and the first two months show a 4% decline at RMB10.3 billion.

Grosses (including booking fees) were down 13% in February at $873 million (RMB6.03 billion) compared with February last year, according to data from Ent Group. They followed a blockbuster January in which takings were up 27% year-on-year. But with the important Chinese New Year holidays this year in different months from 2016, a meaningful comparison only arises by taking the two months together.

On that basis, the data appear to show a degree of stability. Chinese New Year was a strong period for cinema, but this year Valentine’s Day was weaker than last year.

Another sign of stability emerged from average ticket prices, which had recently been on a downward spiral. Although two months do not make a trend, in both January and February the mean nationwide price was $5.21 (RMB36) per admission, higher than the first two months of 2016, and higher also than December last year.

On a per-screen basis, the figures are still cause for concern. In 2016, Chinese operators opened nearly 10,000 new screens, to increase the national circuit by just under a third.

Top films in February were two Chinese New Year releases: “Kung Fu Yoga” and “Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back.” They were followed by “xXx: The Return of Xander Cage.”

Chinese film growth has got to plateau at some point.

[GeneChing]

This is how our copy editor (and my Kung Fu shidi), Gary Shockley, won a free trip to Beijing plus prize money. (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?56820-KFTC-copy-editor-Gary-Shockley&p=1230119#post1230119)


Why China's Screenwriters Are Thriving (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/why-chinas-screenwriters-are-thriving-981211)
6:00 AM PST 3/3/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/03/a_wedding_invitation_still.jpg
Courtesy of China Film Group
'A Wedding Invitation'

Even amid box-office swings, scribes stay in demand, with Chinese screenplays selling for as much as $1 million.

Most Chinese film professionals — both above and below the line — still earn a fraction of what their counterparts in unionized Hollywood pull in. But top Chinese screenwriters are among the select few who are beginning to make Los Angeles-level money.

As Asian dealmakers prepare to descend on Filmart, the annual Hong Kong-based sales market that provides a gateway to China, a number of Beijing studio heads surveyed by THR say it's not uncommon for a script from a pedigreed Chinese writer to sell for half a million dollars or more. One recent script reportedly went for $1 million.

The situation mostly is a matter of supply and demand. China's box office has more than tripled in size during the past five years — from $2.07 billion in 2011 to $6.78 billion in 2016 — and the ferment has inspired a gold rush atmosphere around content creation. But Beijing's previously tiny film community has struggled to keep up with the demand for professional talent and quality product.

Ironically, a slowdown at China's box office in 2016 (growth plummeted to 4.6 percent from 49 percent the year prior) only exacerbated the issue, as most in the industry pointed to low-quality local films as the main cause for the correction, which in turn has upped the appetite for higher-quality screenplays.

"The box office has expanded very quickly, but it takes time for writers to develop professional skills and experience," says Beijing-based screenwriter Shu Huan, who is widely regarded as China's comedy king, thanks to his scripts for two hit road movies: 2013's Lost in Thailand ($197.8 million worldwide gross) and 2015's Lost in Hong Kong ($256.3 million). "Money is not the key resource we lack," he adds. "Currently, we don't have enough experienced talent to meet the demand."

The problem is compounded by a parallel dearth of veteran producers, Beijing insiders say. The box office boom has spawned dozens of new production companies, many of which are run by neophyte film investors.

"There are over a billion people in China, so of course there is no shortage of talented, hungry, young writers," says a local production and acquisitions exec working for a Hollywood studio in Beijing (who wasn't permitted to speak to press on the record). "But many of the people picking projects are totally new to the business, so they don't really have the ability to recognize — or the confidence to support — a promising script from an unknown writer," the exec adds.

Thus, a feeding frenzy has emerged around the small pool of scribes with a hit credit or two to their names, as investors vie for pedigree. Some star writers have even been known to cash in by setting up teams of ghost writers, who help the lead writer churn out more product under their established byline — "It's a seller's market, as the Beijing exec says. (The result of this phenomenon arguably can be seen in last year's box office crunch, which, again, primarily was blamed on the diminished quality of local movies).

http://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/2017/03/lost_in_hong_kong_still.jpg
Courtesy of Well Go USA
Shu's Lost in Hong Kong.

Qin Haiyan, a 33-year-old screenwriter from Beijing, began her career penning art-house fare, such as Zhang Ming's Before Born, which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in 2006. In 2013, she was hired to rework the script for A Wedding Invitation, a planned remake of a hit South Korean tearjerker, as producers were struggling to localize its story to suit Chinese tastes. Qin transformed the material into a romantic comedy, and the film became a modest success, earning $31 million at the Chinese box office.

"Since A Wedding Invitation, I've received offers constantly — sometimes a couple of projects within one week," says Qin. "But because A Wedding Invitation was a romantic story, most [studios and producers] want a love story. I have to choose carefully. They want me to repeat, but I'd rather do new things." (She's currently at work on a film and two TV dramas — one food-themed, the other sci-fi — for one of China's Netflix-like streaming video services.)

Qin concedes that it's difficult to get a first script produced — as it has been for every writer, always, everywhere — but she can't imagine a better place than Beijing to start writing for movies. "I have American friends in L.A. studying screenwriting," she says. "They all say they are jealous of the opportunities in China."

Shu Huan, China's most commercially successful screenwriter of the past five years.
Jetavana
Shu Huan, China's most commercially successful screenwriter of the past five years.

[GeneChing]

Jackie Chan: foreign 'pressure' good for Chinese films (http://news.asiaone.com/news/showbiz/jackie-chan-foreign-pressure-good-chinese-films)

http://news.asiaone.com/sites/default/files/styles/w641/public/original_images/Feb2017/20170207_JACKIECHAN.jpg?itok=2KuI26e5&timestamp=1486437398
Photo: AFP

Action star Jackie Chan said opening up China's heavily-restricted film market to more foreign works would put positive pressure on local filmmakers, as rumours swirl Beijing will expand its quota on imported movies.

Since 2012, China has permitted 34 films to be imported from overseas each year, but the state-run Global Times newspaper reported last month that Chinese and US officials are renegotiating the limit.

A shakeup in domestic movie offerings would challenge Chinese filmmakers to produce better work, Chan told reporters at a Tuesday press conference during the annual gathering of China's political advisory committee, of which he is a member.

"Their technology is more advanced than ours, but on the other hand, we will have more opportunities to watch their films and learn from them," he said.

"We are concerned - very afraid - but I believe that this kind of pressure is a positive thing...the more films that come in, the more we will ourselves improve." Hollywood films accounted for more than half of China's 45.3 billion yuan (S$9.3 billion) in ticket sales last year.

Several Chinese executives also made investments in major Hollywood studios in 2016, drawing attention to China's growing influence over US film.

The Beijing-based Wanda Group broke records last January by paying US$3.5 billion (S$4.9 billion) for Legendary Pictures, the maker of "Jurassic World" and "Godzilla." This move was followed by Alibaba billionaire Jack Ma's investment in Steven Spielberg's Amblin Partners and a reportedly $1 billion agreement between Paramount and two Chinese companies.

The deals have been accompanied by concerns that Hollywood is increasingly pandering to Chinese audiences.

Chan said he frequently fields collaboration requests from firms eager to exploit the country's burgeoning box office, now the world's second-largest movie market after North America.

"I recently attended a meeting with several major executives who said 'okay' to every suggestion I gave," he said.

"My assistant told me, 'You're so awesome.' I said, 'I'm not awesome. It's today's Chinese market that is awesome.' Everyone wants to do business here."



Considering Jackie just got an Oscar (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69700-An-Oscar-for-Jackie-Chan) and his last three films were mediocre at best (ST (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?65866-Skiptrace&p=1295983#post1295983), RT (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68652-Railroad-Tigers), KFY (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68161-Kung-Fu-Yoga&p=1299730#post1299730)), he needs to heed his own advice on this one.

[GeneChing]

At least I won't have to change my column title for a while, although I'm still leaning away from it because no one says 'chollywood' anymore, except for me...:o


China’s Hollywood Deal Frenzy Slows Amid Regulatory Tensions in Both Countries (http://variety.com/2017/biz/asia/hollywood-china-deals-1202004055/)
Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/zhang-yimou-matt-damon-the-great-wall.jpg?w=670&h=377&crop=1
COURTESY OF JASIN BOLAND
MARCH 10, 2017 | 09:45AM PT

Within a few short years, what had once been just talk of big deals between China and Hollywood has become an impressive reality, with a wave of major acquisitions such as Dalian Wanda’s $3.5 billion purchase of Legendary Entertainment and Alibaba’s equity stake in Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Partners.

This story first appeared in the March 07, 2017 issue of Variety. Subscribe today.

But the floodgates now appear to be narrowing, due to political processes underway in both countries. While the deal-making continues — witness the recent announcement that China’s Recon group is shelling out $100 million for a 51% stake in Avi Lerner’s Millennium Pictures — observers say greater government scrutiny on both sides of the Pacific has begun holding up potential agreements that in the past would have sailed through.

On Friday, Dick Clark Productions confirmed that the $1 billion takeover agreement reached with Dalian Wanda has fallen apart, with DCP filing suit to receive the remaining $25 million breakup fee stipulated in the deal.

In the U.S., a perceived Chinese takeover of American entertainment assets has alarmed politicians in much the same way that property purchases in the U.S. by Middle Eastern and Japanese firms aroused suspicion in earlier decades. Some lawmakers have called for an urgent review of Chinese investment in American media companies.

In China, meanwhile, regulators have stepped in to stanch a capital flight accelerated by the weakening of the renminbi. Last October, China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange announced it was putting a halt to “exuberant” overseas deals, a clampdown that has especially affected transactions that are particularly large or represent unusual diversification beyond a company’s existing area of business.

The new regulations may have brought about the collapse of Chinese metals group Xinke’s bid for Voltage Pictures and torpedoed Wanda’s purchase of DCP; both acquisitions might have struck regulators as a step too far outside the buyers’ core business. The capital controls also reportedly helped sink a Chinese bid for control of MGM.

But the new regulations and political climate are likely not the only reasons for a slowdown in China-Hollywood deal-making.

“We have seen Chinese companies walk away from deals when they open up the books, do their due diligence, and find that the assets are not there or the business is not in the shape they previously believed it to be,” one Beijing-based financier told Variety, adding that, in such cases, “the capital controls are a very convenient excuse” to halt the transaction.

Moreover, Chinese companies like Alibaba and Wanda already own foreign assets and enjoy foreign revenues that could be used to finance their foreign M&A activity. Wanda used its U.S.-based (and dollar-based) AMC to acquire Carmike, British exhibitor Odeon-UCI, and the Nordic Cinema Group last year. With the real-estate giant’s assets pegged at $115 billion, it’s hard to tell why Chinese officials would consider Wanda’s purchase of DCP to be too big of a financial stretch.

Officials in Beijing could be using the new regulations as a way to pressure the Chinese entertainment industry to up its game on the creative and content side, rather than relying on overseas takeovers, co-productions, and corporate joint ventures to drive growth.

“The problem now recognized by the regulator is that Chinese companies are not making the films that the rest of the world wants to watch,” says Beijing-based lawyer Mathew Alderson at Harris Bricken. “We get a clue to this thinking from the TV sector, where TV formats have, since July last year, become taboo if the underlying IP is not Chinese-owned. The move is not anti-foreign but is rather about energizing inefficient, uncreative Chinese companies that are simply achieving growth through acquisition.”

This means that sensible deals with Hollywood — those that are correctly priced and relevant — are likely to pass muster with Chinese authorities. Indeed, there are talks underway, in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Besides Recon’s deal for Millennium — for a price significantly below Millennium’s $300 million asking price — China’s HeHe Pictures is buying sales agent Fortissimo from its Netherlands bankruptcy administrators and is in the market for other overseas assets. Chinese investors have been courted by Europe’s Wild Bunch. And respected Hollywood indie Good Universe recently held talks with Chinese backers on raising $50 million, though Good Universe chairman Joe Drake says those talks have run their course.

A closer relationship between international sales and production companies and Chinese players is logical, given the growing importance of the Chinese box office, particularly for certain kinds of movies.

Chinese grosses for Constantin’s “Resident Evil: The Final Chapter” and Revolution Studios’ “XXX: The Return of Xander Cage” outstripped those films’ takes in North America. Millennium’s “The Expendables III” made $73 million in China, about $33 million more than its Stateside haul.

A number of Western companies have linked with Chinese partners to expand their reach in China, the world’s second-biggest theatrical territory, after the U.S. Lionsgate has Chinese slate funding; Regency Enterprises has Chinese funding for a partial slate and saw “Assassin’s Creed” recently open to $18 million in the territory. EuropaCorp is 28% owned by China’s Fundamental Films, and IM Global is now owned by Tang Media.

For leading indie players, having a well-heeled Chinese partner to help with market access, finance, co-production, and marketing makes sense. So expect the deal-making to continue — but the fanfare to be less exuberant.

[GeneChing]

Honestly now, how many HK stars have even crossed over to Hollywood? I'm willing to bet the most people (who aren't rabid martial arts genre fans) don't know past Jackie and Jet. John Woo? Maybe they remember Mission Impossible... Chow Yun Fat? Maybe Pirates... Americans now might recognize Donnie Yen, but not Jiang Wen.


Filmart: Chinese Actors Say Farewell to Hollywood (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/chinese-actors-say-farewell-hollywood-985404)
1:49 AM PST 3/12/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn4.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/03/4c_panda_illo.jpg
Illustration by Mario Zucca

No longer content to play underdeveloped roles in overstuffed tentpoles, China's screen talents are turning down L.A. offers in search of bigger paydays, greater exposure and meatier roles at home.

For Chinese actors, crossing over into Hollywood isn't what it used to be.

Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Hong Kong's A-list talent weren't considered true superstars until they had made their mark in Hollywood. Jackie Chan, Jet Li, John Woo, Stephen Chow and others strove to transport their careers to the larger industry pond of Southern California — and often succeeded. But the growth of the Chinese industry has brought an ironic twist: U.S. studios are more interested in the Middle Kingdom's leading lights than ever before, but today's top Chinese actors aren't necessarily rushing to return the call.

Veteran Chinese casting director PoPing AuYeung (The Forbidden Kingdom, The Karate Kid) brought actor-director Jiang Wen the role of Baze Malbus for Disney's Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. "He turned me down so many times," she says. "He assumed the role would be small and he just wasn't interested. I told the director, [Gareth Edwards], that it was very unlikely that we'd get him." In the end, it was Jiang's son, an avid Star Wars fan, who convinced his dad to take the part.

The reasons behind Chinese stars' reluctance are many and reasonable.

While "making it in Hollywood" used to mean a bigger payday and validation on the world stage, these days many Chinese stars are better-taken care of back home. The growth of the Chinese entertainment market — where the box office has tripled in size over the past five years, $2.07 billion in 2011 to $6.78 billion in 2016 — has lead to an explosion of opportunity and a dearth of pedigreed talent to meet the new demand. With the industry short on both established A-list actors and experienced producers capable of packaging projects for new names, a feeding frenzy-like atmosphere has emerged around proven stars, as China's legions of neophyte film bosses look to lock down names that will give their investors confidence.

And for A-list actors themselves: unprecedented boom times. Last August, China Central Television reported that "China's most high-profile actors and actresses are vastly overpaid, receiving up to 100 million yuan ($15 million) for a single movie or TV series" — a number not wildly high for Hollywood, but massive in a Chinese industry where the usual budget of a major local film is still around $30 million.

Shortly after the CCTV segment, state news outlet Xinhua reported that the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television had "pledged to direct actors' guilds and film and television production companies to formulate self-discipline on the appropriate remuneration of actors and actresses." But producers say little has changed, and market forces still reign.

"The competition for top stars is very tough," says Jerry Ye, CEO of leading local studio Huayi Brothers. "Once you do make a decision to hire a big name, you probably still need to wait at least six months to one year for them to be available. Most of the A-list is already booked through the full year."

During the European Film Market at the Berlin film festival in February, Ye and AuYeung spoke at a panel focused on the challenges of casting films in China today. The panel discussion was organized by Bridging the Dragon, an association connecting European and Chinese film professionals.

Against this lucrative local backdrop, Chinese actors' Hollywood offers usually involve both a steep downgrade in pay and large opportunity costs. "If we go with a Western film, it normally requires much more time than a Chinese production, [which are made much faster]," explains Jessica Chen, founder of leading Chinese talent agency Easy Entertainment, which manages Lu Han, perhaps China's most in-demand pop star-turned-actor (Time Raiders, The Great Wall and the official Chinese marketing ambassador for Star Wars: The Force Awakens).

"And in China, you can do many things at the same time — movies, commercials and a TV show," Chen adds. "If we go overseas, we must give up these other jobs, too."

Chen says all of her talent crave quality roles, and most are willing to forgo a quick payday for a great project, but Hollywood's offers have usually been creatively lacking, too. Over recent years, numerous Hollywood tentpoles have cast A-list Chinese stars in minor parts, hoping for a marketing bump in the growing mainland market. The results have usually backfired, with fans blasting the castings on social media as condescending pandering (see the response to Chinese actor Wang Xueqi's fleeting appearance in Iron Man 3 or Fan Bingbing's small role in X-Men). The actors themselves have even been subjected to some online ridicule, presenting the real risk that their "Hollywood breakthrough" is doing more harm than good in the market that actually matters to them.

Jiang Wen and fellow Chinese star Donnie Yen's performances in Rogue One were broadly perceived as a breakthrough. Not only did the actors escape the usual scorn at home, many international critics praised their onscreen chemistry as one of the film's best qualities. But such roles remain scarce and the pay grade often insultingly low, AuYeung and Chen say.

"I keep telling American producers, you need better, more meaningful roles," says AuYeung. "In the old days, it didn't matter so much, but it's changing really quickly — the first thing any actor asks is whether it's really meaningful."

"And if you want a Chinese star just for marketing a commercial film in China," adds Chen, "please be prepared to pay for it."

[Jimbo]

Honestly now, how many HK stars have even crossed over to Hollywood? I'm willing to bet the most people (who aren't rabid martial arts genre fans) don't know past Jackie and Jet. John Woo? Maybe they remember Mission Impossible... Chow Yun Fat? Maybe Pirates... Americans now might recognize Donnie Yen, but not Jiang Wen.

I haven't seen Rogue One. My only experience of Jiang Wen is from Let the Bullets Fly, which I hated. Others thought it was great, but for a comedy it didn't 'fly' with me. And in that film, I saw nothing special about Jiang Wen. I get that its comedy was cultural, but I simply found it unfunny. Especially the 'comedy' scene involving raping a woman (women?). I personally can't see Jiang Wen ever potentially becoming much of anything in Hollywood, even if they tried to make him a star.

IMO, Hollywood IS pandering to China. Why not cast more American actors of East Asian descent, and allow them to actually portray American characters (without having to affect some accent)? There's a lot of unused talent right here that is seriously being overlooked/ignored.

[GeneChing]

That's my new term for films that were redeemed in China - 'the Warcraft Redemption'. :cool:

OK, give me some time and maybe I'll think up something better. :o


Who the hell watched “Warcraft”? China is fueling the market for overdone Hollywood action movies (https://qz.com/943799/who-the-hell-watched-warcraft-china-is-fueling-the-market-for-overdone-hollywood-action-movies/)
https://qzprod.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/rtr30jx2.jpg?quality=80&strip=all&w=1600
If you build it, they will come. (Reuters/Stringer)

WRITTEN BY Ashley Rodriguez
OBSESSION Glass
March 28, 2017

Hollywood’s failed domestic blockbusters, like Warcraft and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, are among the highest-grossing movies in China—the world’s second-largest box office.
There, China’s 1.3 billion people are more drawn to Hollywood action movies with over-the-top visual effects than the fantasy sagas that lead in North America, John Zeng, president and board director at China’s Wanda Cinemas, said at CinemaCon this week, IndieWire reported.
That explains how Resident Evil: The Final Chapter and xXx: The Return of Xander Cage, which both bombed in the US, managed to beat out Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, and Beauty and the Beast—which topped the North American box office in 2015, 2016, and so far in 2017, respectively. (These movies were all released later in China than the US, with the exception of Beauty and the Beast.)

China alone made up half of Warcraft’s $433 million global box-office total. Domestically, it only brought in around $47 million, which was about 30% of the estimated $160 million it cost to make the movie, according to Box Office Mojo.

https://www.theatlas.com/charts/SJqm7f_ne
https://www.theatlas.com/charts/r12yfMd2e

Chinese audiences are also resistant to Hollywood animation, Zeng reportedly said. That’s why big releases like Finding Dory and The Secret Life of Pets haven’t found as much success there as in the US. But some Hollywood titles with global appeal, like Zootopia, have been able to tap into China’s love for the genre.
And Chinese audiences love 3D movies, said Zeng, whose company also owns America’s largest theater chain, AMC Theatres, where 3D films don’t have the same cachet and are slowly disappearing. (Theaters charge more to watch a 3D film.)
China’s box office once threatened to overtake North America after nearly a decade of stupendous growth. But last year it hit a wall. China’s movie-ticket revenue grew less than 4% to 45.7 billion yuan ($6.6 billion), compared to a 48% lift the previous year, the Hollywood Reporter wrote, citing data from the state-run body that oversees film.
Zeng projected, through a translator at CinemaCon, that the Chinese box office will now grow between 15% and 20%, annually.

[GeneChing]

This is so China to me - who else would cook their box office books? It's become a matter of face. :eek:


China Punishes 326 Cinemas for Box-Office Fraud (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-punishes-326-cinemas-box-office-fraud-988205)
8:41 PM PDT 3/22/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn3.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2016/11/beijing_skyline.jpg
Getty Images
Beijing

After years of suspected impropriety, the crackdown comes as welcome news to Hollywood, which increasingly relies on the China market for growth.

China has rolled out a sweeping crackdown on box-office fraud at the multiplex this week, outing some 326 local cinemas for cooking the books. The action marks the first major enforcement of the country's new film law, which went into effect March 1.

China's media regulator released a public list of offenders on Tuesday, with one official calling box-office fraud a "chronic disease" holding back the healthy development of the film industry.

The offending cinemas have been slapped with screening suspensions and steep fines, depending on the level of their crimes. They also are required to return all misappropriated funds to the film producers and distributors affected.

Sixty-three cinemas were found guilty of fraud amounting to approximately RMB 1 million (about $145,000) in 2016. As punishment, they have been ordered closed for 90 days beginning March 27.

Another 63 cinemas were ordered closed for 60 days over fraud totaling RMB 500,000 to RMB 1 million, while 110 more reported fraudulent numbers between RMB 100,000 and 500,000, resulting in a fine of RMB 200,000. The rest were let off with warnings.

Chinese cinemas have been known to employ various techniques to game the box office, such as under-reporting ticket sales, reporting profits from one film to another, or selling tickets to distributors in bulk (tickets to the distributors' own titles) to create the false appearance of a hit film for marketing gain.

The raid on legerdemain at the ticket gates will be welcome news to Hollywood, which has come to rely on China, the world's second-largest film market, as a major source of revenue.

As recently as 2013, industry experts believed that at least 10 percent of all Chinese box-office sales were lost to fraud.

In September 2015, China Film Group was caught rigging grosses in favor of a state propaganda picture, The Hundred Regiments Offensive, released to coincide with the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II. CFG issued a set of orders and incentives to Chinese theater chains designed to boost the movie's performance, which resulted in theaters reallocating revenue from competing films — notably Paramount's Terminator: Genisys, which was believed to have lost as much as $11 million due to money siphoned away from it.


PATRICK BRZESKI
THRnews@thr.com
@thr

[GeneChing]

The key in reading this is seeing that there's still growth, but it's not at the meteoric rise that it was before, meaning the bubble hasn't burst, it just didn't float as high as everyone wanted.

Whatever the case, you gotta luv a name like Rance Pow.


How Hollywood Blockbusters Could Rescue the Chinese Box Office (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/how-hollywood-blockbusters-could-rescue-chinese-box-office-992011)
8:00 AM PDT 4/18/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn2.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/04/2473_d061_00331r-h_2017.jpg
Universal Studios
'The Fate of the Furious'

The Middle Kingdom looks to star-driven tentpoles like 'The Fate of the Furious' and 'Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales' to drive profits after a disappointing year of low market growth.
By all accounts, 2016 was a disappointing year at the Chinese box office, but three months into the new year, Hollywood fare has created optimism for a rebound. Already, three U.S. imports have crossed the 1 billion RMB mark (an important local milestone) in China: xXx: Return of Xander Cage ($163.6 million), Resident Evil: The Final Chapter ($159.5 million) and The Fate of the Furious ($216 million and counting). Even more encouraging is the fact that many of Hollywood's biggest China-friendly tentpoles have yet to hit the market.

"As the 2017 year opens up, there will be many major studio films we'll be following," says Rance Pow, president of the Shanghai-based cinema consulting firm Artisan Gateway. Indeed, if the blockbuster pedigree of the big-budget releases on the horizon is any indication, China's box office is in for a major boost.

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Courtesy of Disney Enterprises
All five Pirates of the Caribbean movies will screen at Beijing.

Universal's The Fate of the Furious opened April 14 and smashed local records; and Paramount's Transformers: The Last Night is due this summer. The preceding films in each of those franchises achieved historic grosses in China: $390 million for Furious 7 (2015) and $320 million for Transformers 4 (2014). Hopes also are sky high for Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, the latest in the series that has steadily gained in popularity in the Middle Kingdom — the first installment made just $2.8 million in 2003, but the most recent, 2011's On Stranger Tides, took in $70 million — and China's total box office has more than tripled in size since then.

China's enduring love of the effects-heavy U.S. tentpole is getting a well-timed PR boost at the Beijing International Film Festival, where the entire Fast and the Furious and Pirates franchises currently are screening.

The Hollywood cavalry couldn't arrive at a better time. After expanding 48 percent in 2015, China's previously red-hot theatrical market eked out just 3.7 percent growth last year. For Hollywood, the market declined in U.S. dollar terms — to $6.6 billion from $6.8 billion in 2015 — thanks to the recent strength of the American currency.

But despite its exchange-rate woes, Hollywood fare did better in China than did native films. International titles, the vast majority of which were American, earned $2.7 billion, up 10.9 percent in local currency, compared with $2.6 billion in 2015. Prior to the release of Fate of the Furious last weekend, revenue-sharing imports (studio tentpoles) had already jumped 43.9 percent, according to Artisan Gateway data, while fixed-fee imports have soared 72.2 percent. By the time Fast 8's run is complete, Hollywood's 2017 tally will have raced even further ahead of last year's pace.

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/2017/04/tf5-ff-001-embed.jpg
Courtesy of Paramount Pictures
Transformers: The Last Night arrives this summer; the most recent installment in the franchise took in $320 million in the Middle Kingdom.

Pow notes that China's top-line growth number will depend on the quality of forthcoming Chinese titles given that local films accounted for 58 percent of the box office in 2016. Since Chinese regulators are known to clamp down on imports when Chinese product falls below 55 percent market share, Hollywood also has an interest in the health of the local industry.

Says Pow: "We'll be watching closely for stronger Chinese-language titles to support a market lift, perhaps into double-digit figures, which would be good for all stakeholders in the film industry — and most of all the audience."

[GeneChing]

Yet another Chinese Tomb Raider flick...


Beijing Film Festival: Jackie Chan, Li Bingbing Head Slate of 15 Chinese-Australian Co-Productions (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/beijing-film-festival-jackie-chan-li-bingbing-head-slate-15-chinese-australian-productions-9957)
11:51 PM PDT 4/19/2017 by Pip Bulbeck

http://cdn2.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/04/guardians_of_the_tomb.jpg
Screen Australia
'Guardians of the Tomb'

The new films include upcoming features from directors Yiwei Liu and Dalei Guo.
Chinese-Australian co-productions got a shot in the arm at the Beijing Film Festival on Thursday with 15 features being announced including films starring Jackie Chan and Li Bingbing

14 of those films are part of a development slate worth $300 million that's been put together by production group Sydney Film. The fifteenth film on the slate, writer-director Yiwei Liu’s At Last, has been awarded official Chinese –Australian co-production status, the seventh film to be designated as such.

At Last centers on a couple from Beijing who find themselves caught in a complex art heist while on holiday in Australia. It will shoot in Queensland, Australia from July, injecting $8.1 million (AUS$10.8 million) into the local economy. Casting is currently underway.

Guardians of The Tomb, starring Li Bingbing and currently in post-production is the most recent official coproduction between the two nations since the treaty was signed a decade ago. Others have included Bait 3D, and Children of The Silk Road, with My Extraordinary Wedding and Tying The Knot set to go into production.

At Last is being produced by Jackie Jiao, Todd Fellman, Charles Fan and Vanessa Wu, from China's Monumental Films, Australia's Roadman Films and Story Bridge Films.

Richard Harris, Head of Business and Audience at Screen Australia, which manages the official co-production program, said: “We have seen increased interest in Australian-Chinese co-productions with At Last being the fourth feature announced since late 2015. This upswing in activity is the result of seven years of engagement with the Chinese screen industry and the sustained support of the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television in China.”

At the same time Sydney Film, part of the Pacific Holdings Group, said it was aiming to identify 20 existing or potential co-production films with an overall investment budget of $300 million (¥2 billion). All films will be shot in both China and Australia, with several productions intending to use multiple locations across Australia.

Amongst the 14 films already on the group’s slate are Dalei Guo’s comedies A Trip to Australia and Once Upon A Time In The Northeast- Artistic Youth, Trader Behind the Scenes, written by Dong Minghui and based on his own experiences of the China stock market crash in 2015 and Dream Reader Union, a sci-fi feature involving ancient Emperors and Dragon lore and a young hacker who discovers he is bound together with five strangers who are entrusted with saving the world from an imminent threat.

The films were unveiled at an Australian event at the Beijing Film Festival held by locations marketing agency Ausfilm and the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

The relationship between the Chinese and Australian film industries is deepening with Jackie Chan’s Bleeding Steel the biggest budget Chinese feature ever to film in Australia. Australian films including Hacksaw Ridge and Bait 3D have enjoyed Chinese box office success and the number of Chinese films released in Australian cinemas topped 30 in 2016 with The Mermaid grossing over $976,000.

[GeneChing]

Maybe I should change from 'Chollywood Rising' to 'China Film Infiltrating'... ;)


Paramount's China Partners Now Financing 30 Percent of Slate (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/viacom-paramounts-china-deal-is-operation-partners-financing-30-percent-slate-1000160)
6:04 AM PDT 5/4/2017 by Georg Szalai

http://cdn4.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2016/07/gettyimages-177479755-h_2016.jpg
Mark Davis/Getty Images

"There is no question that Paramount will turn," says Viacom CEO Bob Bakish as he and CFO Wade Davis praise new studio head Jim Gianopulos.
Viacom management emphasized on its quarterly earnings conference call Thursday that Paramount Pictures' film slate financing deal with two Chinese partners was on track despite concern amid China's recent moves to keep money in the country.

As THR reported in March, Paramount had back then yet to receive the first payment it had expected from the deal.

Viacom CEO Bob Bakish said on Thursday's call that the company has "moved ahead" with the deal. Viacom CFO Wade Davis gave analysts more details, saying that Paramount's slate deal with Shanghai Film Group and Huahua Media remains "remains on track and is in operation."

And he added that the two companies are actually committing more money. "The partners have elected to upsize their commitment from 25 percent to 30 percent," he said.

The deal has been known to be worth around $1 billion and run over a three-year period. Davis said that remains the case, also mentioning the partners' option to extend for a fourth year.

"We never really had concerns about payment," Davis said. "There is a payment schedule in the agreement, and we are going to receive cash this quarter per the schedule that was always in the agreement."

Paramount's cash infusion from China was announced in January, but believed to be in jeopardy because of increased scrutiny from Beijing regulators and a recent leadership shakeup at the studio that brought in Jim Gianopulos as chairman and CEO to take over from Brad Grey.

Sources said Gianopulos spent much of a recent week in Beijing meeting with executives from the two Chinese investors. The talks were a continuation of discussions held between the parties in Los Angeles in the weeks prior, sources said. Gianopulos' primary task during the talks was to sell his vision and establish a relationship, sources said.

On the call, Bakish also gave a shoutout to Gianopulos, calling him a "smart, seasoned executive" who is looking to reenergize the studio and its film pipeline. He also said Gianopulos was working with the company's TV networks to develop co-branded projects, Bakish said.

Bakish said he has already felt the presence of the new studio boss in a positive way, saying he was "very optimistic" about its outlook under the new leader. "There is no question that Paramount will turn," Bakish said.

Davis added that Gianopulos has "jump-started the culture there" and fine-tuned certain processes at Paramount. The CFO said those are some things that "we expect to have a positive impact on '18."

The CFO also said there could be more, but smaller film unit charges ahead as Gianopulos assesses previously ordered films. He signaled the new studio boss could, for example, choose not to go ahead with select projects if he doesn't see real potential in them. Viacom previously took a $115 million for Monster Trucks, which was released in the first calendar quarter of this year.

Bakish also articulated what specific changes Viacom has made in its pursuit of a turnaround and what’s still to come. He reiterated the need to refit the organization, create partnerships instead of adversaries, especially in affiliate sales, and a focus on core brands and values.

He highlighted that MTV remains a particular focus as it will need time to gain traction by concentrating on its traditional live and unscripted programming. Bakish said he was excited about an expanded slate of new content and new talent set to debut on MTV in the near future.

Bakish on Thursday also discussed two issues of investor concern in recent days – advertising trends and pay TV subscriber trends.

On the ad market, he mentioned early upfront market talks, saying: “While it is early days, I am optimistic about this year’s upfront and believe that both television and Viacom are well positioned.”

On pay TV and distribution issues, Bakish said his team was foused on “how we can build more value for all parties.”
That is why “we are not waiting until [carriage] renewals to engage," he continued. "In fact, we are currently actively engaged with a number of parties all outside the traditional renewal discussions." He detailed that "we are speaking with several [pay TV distributors] regarding variations on the entertainment skinny pack concept," adding: "We are optimistic that one could launch by the end of this year.”

The call took place after Viacom earlier on Thursday reported better-than-expected underlying financials for its fiscal second quarter. Right after the earnings report, Viacom's stock in pre-market trading rose, but it dropped once the market opened. As of 10 a.m. ET, it was down 3 percent as investors seemed to focus more on ad and pay TV distribution concerns than the better-than-expected results.

[GeneChing]

How Hollywood Is Squeezing More From China Film Deals (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/how-hollywood-is-squeezing-more-china-film-deals-1012699)
7:00 AM PDT 6/16/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/06/gettyimages-483970042_-_h_2017.jpg
Johannes Eisele/Getty Images

New backend pacts offer studios a bigger slice of the box-office pie.

Traditionally, there have been just two ways for a Hollywood movie to gain access to China's massive theatrical market. A studio can lobby to secure one of Beijing's coveted release slots under the country's notorious quota system, which limits foreign film imports to just 34 titles per year and pays out merely a 25 percent share of box office. Or, a production company can resort to China's less visible secondary import mechanism, known as the flat-fee, or buyout, model. Under this system, Chinese distribution companies negotiate a one-time fixed price with the foreign production company for the rights to release the film in China, taking all box-office revenue in return.

The U.S. and China currently are engaged in a closely watched renegotiation of the quota system, which is the distribution method preferred — and dominated — by the Hollywood majors.

The rest of the hundreds of movies produced around the world each year have had to hope to secure flat-fee deals. But while industry attention always has focused on the once vastly more lucrative quota slots, both the volume and value of the film deals utilizing the flat-fee system have surged. In 2016, 51 international movies were sold into China for a flat fee, compared with just 28 the year prior.

"The buyout price for flat-fee films has been going up constantly," notes Stan Rosen, a professor at USC who specializes in the Chinese film industry. "In the old days, studios would sell a movie for $20,000 to $50,000, because piracy was rampant. Now, the right film can go for up to $10 million."

Perhaps even more significant for Hollywood, the structuring of such deals has become more flexible and beneficial to the rights owner. Under a newly emerging deal structure — which is somewhat akin to a hybrid of the two old systems — the Chinese distributor pays a minimum guarantee for the right to distribute the film in partnership with China Film Group or Huaxia (the two state-backed companies that hold a duopoly over film imports). But once the movie crosses certain pre-agreed box-office milestones, the foreign producer becomes entitled to a share of revenue or lump-sum bonuses.

"The market is opening now, and there are many different types of deals — you can propose and discuss anything," says Zhang Jin, CEO of Beijing-based Joy Pictures, which successfully imported Lionsgate's La La Land under an arrangement of this kind (the film earned $30 million in China).

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Courtesy of Ilze Kitshoff/Sony
Resident Evil: The Final Chapter was acquired by China’s Leomus Pictures with a minimum guarantee and went on to gross $160 million.

"Before, it was all flat deals, but now everyone is talking about a minimum guarantee with backend bonuses or a share of box office," adds Zhang, noting that sellers at Cannes in May were almost universally unwilling to accept a simple flat-fee offer for China rights.

The new model is expected to dominate sales negotiations at the Shanghai International Film Festival, further propelling the event's global importance.

The Chinese release of Resident Evil: The Final Chapter in February is regarded as a watershed moment. Acquired by growing film marketing player Leomus Pictures with a minimum guarantee understood to be in the $5 million to $10 million range, the China release went on to earn a huge $160 million in the Middle Kingdom.

"It's indicative of the Chinese film market taking off as well as it has," says Rosen. "For a film that is prominent and well known in North America, Europe and Japan, why let China get it for next to nothing? People are tired of that. That used to happen before, but times have changed."

This story first appeared in the June 14 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine.

I have this feeling that Transformers (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?47070-Transformers&p=1303443#post1303443) will be the next film to cash out in PRC.

[GeneChing]

Shanghai: China's Box Office Predicted to Grow as Much as 16 Percent in 2017
(http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/shanghai-chinas-box-office-predicted-grow-as-as-16-percent-2017-1015001)3:37 AM PDT 6/21/2017 by Abid Rahman

http://cdn2.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/04/2473_tp_00140r_-_h_2017.jpg
Courtesy of Universal Pictures
'Fate of the Furious' made $392 million at the box office in China

After years of stellar growth, the county's theatrical market slowed dramatically last year, but Chinese analysts predict a rebound.
After a sluggish performance in 2016, China's box-office revenue is projected to grow as much 16 percent this year, according to an analysis by Fudan University.

The rosy box office figures came from Dr. Qin Chen, a research fellow at the Fudan University School of Economics, who presented his findings to industry insiders at the Fanink sponsored forum held at the Shanghai International Film Festival on Tuesday.

Chen said that based on the performance of the first half of 2017, the Middle Kingdom's theatrical market will grow in a range between 9.7 percent and 15.9 percent year-on-year for a total revenue range forecast of $7.4 billion-$7.8 billion (Ұ50.5 billion-Ұ53.3 billion).

The optimistic outlook is at odds with 2016, when China's total box-office growth slowed markedly. Ticket revenue growth slowed to 3.7 percent to reach Ұ45.7 billion ($6.58 billion), according to official data from China's State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television.

Last year's weaker gain at China's box office was attributed to a combination of factors and subject of much debate. Chief among the reasons were weaker local films, a crackdown on box-office fraud, big cutbacks in generous ticket subsidies from fast-growing online platforms and overall weakness in the Chinese economy.

Chen pointed to the fast start made at the Chinese box office this year, with big Hollywood tentpoles leading the charge. Universal's Fate of the Furious raced past the competition earlier this year to become the biggest foreign movie in China ever, clocking up a massive $392 million. Kong: Skull Island hit pay dirt in the world's second movie market with $168 million, a figure that was level pegging with its domestic take.

The big surprise was Sony's Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, which grabbed a hugely impressive $160 million to spark talk of more sequels. There were also strong performances from Logan ($106 million), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 ($101 million) and Beauty and the Beast ($85.8 million). Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales is still in theaters in China and has already made more than $140 million in its run so far.

There have also been a few big local films, with Jackie Chan's martial arts comedy Kung Fu Yoga earning $254 million, and Tsui Hark-directed comedy Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back picking up $240 million.

The second half of the year also looks promising with the fifth Transformers movie opening in the country on Friday. Transformers: Age of Extinction grossed $320 million in China in 2014 and became a country-wide phenomenon. Sony's Spider-Man: Homecoming and Universal's Despicable Me 3 should also do good business in China.

Part of the reason why it 'slowed dramatically last year' was because it was on such a ridiculous meteoric rise. Once the fervor cooled down, it appeared to slump, but really it just normalized. Regardless, the growth has continued. And someday, I'll have to change to title of my column.

[GeneChing]

Hollywood Auditing China Box Office In First Look At Middle Kingdom Books (http://deadline.com/2017/06/hollywood-audit-china-box-office-mpaa-1202120540/)
by Nancy Tartaglione
June 27, 2017 3:35am

http://i1.wp.com/pmcdeadline2.files.wordpress.com/2017/05/china.jpg?crop=0px%2C1036px%2C4200px%2C2814px&resize=446%2C299&ssl=1
Sebastien Thibault

While box office manipulation has long been a major issue in China, the vast market has increasingly vowed to crack down on cheats. Now, the MPAA has hired an accounting firm to audit Middle Kingdom ticket sales on a select number of films. This is the first time the Hollywood studios are availing themselves of a clause in the longform agreement with China which gives them the ability to take their own close look at the books.

I understand that the decision to trigger the audit was a group call made by the MPAA’s member companies. While it’s a sensitive subject, the practice has happened in other markets and helps gain a better understanding of the exhibition and distribution sectors. In China, they’ve been historically murky to say the least. Bloomberg first reported news of the current steps taken by the MPAA amid concern over inaccurate reporting.

It’s not clear what titles the audit is looking at, nor when it will conclude — this is a market of over 40K screens with nearly 40 Hollywood movies released on a revenue-share basis in 2016 and more under flat-fee deals.

But, it’s a smart move as the world’s fastest-growing market becomes an increasingly important part of Hollywood economics. Although box office improvement ground to a sputter of just 3.7% in 2016, this year has seen Hollywood dominate. Eight films have already crossed the $100M mark locally, led by smash The Fate Of The Furious.

The PROC powers-that-be have also been more carefully policing their own back yard in recent months. Last November, authorities established a new film industry law which vowed to be tough on box office fraud, ultimately resulting in suspensions, fines and warnings this past March.

Earlier in 2016, SAPPRFT slapped the distributor of Hong Kong actioner Ip Man 3 with a one-month suspension from releasing films after investigating it for fraud. That was after the distributor of 2015 hit Monster Hunt had given away $6.2M worth of tickets for “public welfare screenings” and acknowledged there were overnight and duplicate showings.

Also in 2015, there were reports of box office being falsely goosed when moviegoers buying tickets to see Terminator: Genisys were sold entries to propaganda film The Hundred Regiments Offensive so that the coin would go into the local film’s coffers. Write-ins then allowed folks to instead see the film they initially sought. The state stayed silent on that one.

Indeed, 2015 came replete with what execs have previously characterized as “shenanigans” and “tricks.” Per a 2016 Xinhua report, statistics indicate that at least 10% of all box office takings have been “stolen” in recent years.

News of the audit comes as China and the U.S. Trade Representative have begun negotiations on a new industry contract. The last one in 2012 upped the quota floor on foreign films to 34 and increased to 25% the box office revenue share. This time around, the studios are looking to improve terms. On the agenda are discussions about another possible revenue-share hike; more transparency and flexibility over release dates; and potentially an increase in the number of rev-share titles (although there are schools for and against as PROC P&A costs rise). Those talks will likely continue into next year.

Curious to see how this goes...

[GeneChing]

You can see the ad if you follow the link.

Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising) enlists Jackie (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?41790-Jackie-Chan) & Donnie (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?58046-Donnie-Yen-Uber-Awesome-!!), et.al.


China requires all cinemas to show a three-minute-long propaganda video before every movie as Beijing tightens censorship (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4671142/China-requires-cinemas-propaganda-video.html)

The video was introduced into Chinese cinemas on July 1
It features celebrities such as Jackie Chan and Donnie Yen speaking
The video focuses on the 'Chinese dream' and not dissapointing your country

By Sophie Williams For Mailonline
PUBLISHED: 08:00 EDT, 6 July 2017 | UPDATED: 08:09 EDT, 6 July 2017

Cinema goers in China are now subject to watching a three-and-a-half minute long propaganda video before watching the film they were intending to see.

From now up until the 19th National People's Congress later this autumn, people will sit through the video aiming to promote national unity and 'the Chinese dream'.

The video has had a mixed response with claims that some movie-goers have been avoiding going into the screening before the advert comes on.

Screen idols star in Chinese Dream cinema campaign propaganda

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2017/07/06/11/4214B6D100000578-0-image-m-3_1499337735571.jpg
The video features many well-known Chinese figures sharing their views on China's dream

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2017/07/06/11/4214B6D900000578-0-image-a-5_1499337773740.jpg
Chan tells the audience: 'Country is good, people are good, everything will be good'

The three-minute video was produced by the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT).

It will be shown from now up until the 19th People's Congress this coming autumn. During the People's Congress, President Xi will start his second five-year term as President.

According to state-media, the video aims to help people better understand party policies.

It includes famous Chinese actors such as Jackie Chan, Angelababy and recent Rogue One and IP man actor Donnie Yen.

Jackie Chan tells the audience: 'The country is good, the people are good, everyone will be good. Everyone fight for the Chinese dream, only then can you get the dream to come true. The power of the Chinese dream.'

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2017/07/06/11/4214B6C900000578-0-image-m-7_1499337788545.jpg
Donnie Yen reads a quote from Mao Zedong in the video shown before a feature film

The video starts out with patriotic music before saying: 'The Chinese dream is an international dream, people's dream, everyone's dream.'

Chinese actress Li Bingbing can be heard saying: 'No matter what you do, as long as you respect the country, our society, our nation and our family, you are helping us to realise the Chinese dream.'

A cinema employee in Beijing told the Global Times: 'Many came late for the movie just to avoid the short video and others complained about the video after watching the movie.'

Many people have commented on the video on Chinese site Weibo.

One user said: 'We must work hard together to create the Chinese dream!'

While another wrote: 'The Chinese dream is the dream of every Chinese person and we should encourage it.'

China makes further crackdown on its internet to curb anything that doesn't fall in line with socialist values

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2017/07/06/12/420BB1C800000578-4671142-image-a-9_1499342356567.jpg
All content posted on the internet is to be checked that it is in line with socialist values

The advert comes as China announces further measures to crack down on the country's internet.

Over the past month, Chinese regulators have closed gossip websites and restricted what videos people can post on the grounds of inappropriate content.

Last week, an industry association circulated new regulations that require all audiovisual content posted online to be checked.

Documentaries, micro movies, sports and educational material will all have to adhere to core 'socialist values.'

Topics deemed not in line with these values include drug addiction and ****sexuality.

[GeneChing]

Hollywood's China Money Heartbreak: Is the Love Affair Really Over? (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/hollywoods-china-money-heartbreak-is-love-affair-1027713)
5:00 AM PDT 8/10/2017 by Scott Roxborough , Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/08/thr_china_agnew_-_h_2017.jpg
Zhang Peng/LightRocket (Money), Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post (Trump), Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg (Xi), Chip Somodevilla (Scaramucci), Win McNamee (Schumer), Han Haidan/CNSPHOTO/VCG (Wang), all Getty Images

Billions have been thrown into turmoil as Chinese regulators crack down on investments, Paramount’s backer skips a payment and both Trump and some Dems adopt a protectionist stance.

For nearly five years, Hollywood has been buoyed by a flood of cash from China in the form of both surging box-office revenue and multibillion-dollar investments in studio slates and independent film companies.

The most high-profile pacts have involved some of the biggest brands in both China and Hollywood, such as real estate behemoth Dalian Wanda, which bought Legendary Entertainment for $3.5 billion in 2016 and owns leading U.S. cinema exhibitor AMC Entertainment; internet giant Alibaba, which in October took an equity stake in Steven Spielberg’s shingle Amblin; China Media Capital, which owns part of Brian Grazer and Ron Howard’s Imagine Entertainment; and Fosun, financiers of Jeff Robinov’s Studio 8.

With a largely stagnant domestic movie business — so far this year, box-office receipts in North America are down 3 percent — the film studios have come to rely on Chinese capital to get their movies made and keep profits climbing.

But economic and political shifts coming from both Washington and Beijing are threatening to create a perfect storm of regulatory upheaval that could sink, or at least beach, future U.S.-China media deals.

“Hollywood should be worried because now we are seeing pressure [to crack down on deals] from both ends,” says Stanley Rosen, a professor of political science at USC who studies China’s film industry. “Access to the Chinese market will continue, but investment from China in the U.S. entertainment industry will be toned down considerably.”

Already there are signs of disruption in the Sino-Hollywood love affair. Several big deals that were in the works — Wanda’s $1 billion takeover of Dick Clark Productions, the $345 million acquisition of Voltage Pictures by Chinese mining group Anhui Xinke and a $416 million investment by China’s HNA Group in U.S. in-flight entertainment provider Golden Eagle — have failed, with sources citing a regulatory crackdown in China as a major reason for their demise.

Another high-profile deal involving HNA — the company’s planned $200 million acquisition of Skybridge Capital, an investment group controlled by former White House director of communications Anthony Scaramucci — also could face renewed scrutiny in what would be yet another blow for “The Mooch,” whom President Trump fired just 10 days into the job.

The protectionist tendencies of Trump, who made China-bashing a pillar of his election campaign, have found rare bipartisan support from Capitol Hill, with several lawmakers pushing for increased regulatory scrutiny of Sino-Hollywood deals. On Aug. 1, Sen. Chuck Schumer, the ranking Democrat in the Senate, went a step further, calling on Trump to block all major Chinese investment in the U.S. as a means of pressuring Beijing to do more to deter North Korea’s nuclear missile program.

Meanwhile, Beijing officials have tightened restrictions on outside investment by mainland firms, worried that too many companies are using U.S. media acquisitions as a means of funneling money offshore. On Aug. 3, Viacom disclosed that it did not receive its expected June payment from Huahua Media, the Chinese group that has a three-year, $1 billion deal to fund 25 percent or more of Paramount’s film slate. Paramount has been counting on that cash to help it bounce back from years of financial losses.

Then there’s the case of Dalian Wanda, which in July saw its standing as perhaps China’s most aggressive acquirer of Hollywood assets — including Legendary and AMC — plummet after the company and its brash chairman, Wang Jianlin, became the target of a crackdown on debt that resulted in the $9.3 billion sale of the bulk of its theme park and hotel interests. The company now reportedly is barred from receiving loans from the country’s biggest banks, leading some to question the long-term financial health of the U.S. companies in its stable.

Legendary insists it is “business as usual,” but the studio has significant overhead (with about 300 employees) and doesn’t have a new film hitting theaters until the spring, when it rolls out Pacific Rim: Uprising, the sequel to the 2013 actioner that grossed $411 million worldwide. Legendary’s recent run has been mixed, with the flop of The Great Wall set against the global success of Kong: Skull Island. In 2015, the last year for which figures are available, Legendary lost $560 million.

There have been some encouraging signs that business still is being done, such as the Aug. 7 announcement that Tang Media Partners, which has several Chinese backers, finalized the acquisition of troubled Spotlight studio Open Road Films. While incoming CEO Rob Friedman says the deal is secure from Chinese regulators ("I have no concerns about that whatsoever," he tells THR), truly big deals of the Wanda-Legendary or Alibaba-Amblin variety look scarce.

All eyes now are on Paramount’s financing agreement with Huahua, the last big studio slate deal signed after China began its crackdown. The deal has been a money loser for Huahua so far, with disappointing box-office performances for Paramount’s recent titles, including Transformers: The Last Knight, which underperformed in the Middle Kingdom, earning about $230 million compared with $320 million in China for Transformers: Age of Extinction.

Christopher Spicer, an attorney at Akin Gump who has packaged several China pacts, says studio slate deals are unlikely to be impacted by the current crackdown. Instead, he sees problems for U.S. film companies looking for Chinese corporate equity. Deals like the one China Media Capital inked with Imagine Entertainment or Fosun with Studio 8 — a Chinese company spending big to acquire a piece of a Hollywood production house — might become a thing of the past.

“I don’t think the dream’s over … but companies selling for crazy [money] to Chinese companies, those deals are over,” says Spicer, who believes several China-Hollywood deals in the works still could go through, provided the Chinese firms in question have “enough money parked offshore” to bypass government restrictions on exporting capital.

Lindsay Conner, a partner in charge of entertainment and media at the L.A. office of Manatt, cautions that large investments in Hollywood by Chinese companies outside the entertainment field — Voltage suitor Anhui Xinke is a mining company, and HNA Group runs a Chinese airline — could be over. “The Chinese government will continue to be skeptical of non-entertainment companies in China throwing money into entertainment investments,” he says. “They are concerned that it is motivated in part by a desire to get money out of China.”

Conner, however, believes Beijing will continue to support established entertainment companies with global expansion plans. He expects deal making to pick up again by the end of the year, particularly after the ruling Communist Party holds its national congress in the Fall.

“It's no longer a gold rush but (China) has shown they are still willing to let mature Chinese entertainment companies make thoughtful investments in Hollywood,” he says. “I believe that after a relatively brief period of lesser activity we will see a renewed level of activity."

Others see the political saber rattling between Washington and Beijing as a sign that things likely are to get worse — maybe much worse. In his letter to the president, Sen. Schumer said Trump should use his authority over the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. to hit Beijing with a suspension on “all mergers and acquisitions in the U.S. by Chinese entities.”

If Trump wants to crack down on China, he has a number of options, including enacting Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act which allows the Commander and Chief to take unilateral punitive measures, including fines and tariffs, against countries deemed guilty of “unfair” trading practices. Even the mere talk of such a move, insiders say, could pressure regulators to more closely scrutinize future deals and cast a pall over the Sino-Hollywood relationship.

“Already you are seeing a more cautious approach on the part of regulators who are worried about potential political blowback if they approve a deal,” says DJ Rosenthal, a Washington-based analyst with corporate investigations and risk consulting firm Kroll.

If Trump does take the nuclear option and reactivates Section 301, it could spell disaster for U.S.-Chinese business, not least because Beijing is likely to play tit for tat, imposing fines or restrictions of its own on U.S. companies.

“They have a huge range of options,” notes Rosen. “They can slap a billion dollar fine on American companies working in China, they can add new regulations or restrictions to anyone doing business there. We are in a very bad position to try and influence the Chinese on this issue. They have a long-term plan and speak with one voice. We have no clear policy and an administration that says different, and contradictory, things one day to the next.”

A version of this story first appeared in the Aug. 9 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine.

Media control time?

[GeneChing]

Wolf Warrior 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2) rekindled Chollywood's rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising).


Wolf Warrior 2 and the Future of Imported Films in China (http://www.chinalawblog.com/2017/08/wolf-warrior-2-and-the-future-of-imported-films-in-china.html)
By Matthew Dresden on August 21, 2017
POSTED IN CHINA BUSINESS, CHINA FILM INDUSTRY

http://www.chinalawblog.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/110/2017/08/CELINA_JADE_with_WU_JING_Wolf_Warrior_2-600x400.jpg

What a wild ride it’s been for the Chinese film industry! Until July 27, it had been a year of one depressing story after another. Downward-trending box office, high-flying entertainment companies imploding, deals to purchase foreign assets falling through, the biggest movie studio on the planet sold to a real estate developer, the can’t miss co-production The Great Wall tanking. Even the Transformers franchise couldn’t save the day, with the latest installment performing well below expectations in China.

But on July 27, the action film Wolf Warrior 2 opened, and within 12 days of its release it had already become the highest-grossing film of all time in China. As of this writing the film has pulled in more than $720 million in China alone. The narratives are almost writing themselves, with pundits trying to explain why Chinese people are going in droves to see a jingoistic film about a Chinese special forces operative in Africa.

I’m not going to wade into those waters except to note William Goldman’s aphorism that when it comes to the film business, “Nobody knows anything.” The phenomenal success of Wolf Warrior 2 was anything but a foregone conclusion. The first movie was a surprise hit, earning about $89 million, but it’s not like people were lining up Episode 1-style for a sequel. Back in May, Wolf Warrior 2 was pilloried online when it came to light that its trailer had lifted footage from X-Men: First Class. Moreover, Wolf Warrior 2 was released on the same date as the government-backed propaganda film The Founding of an Army, and the latter was allotted the lion’s share of screens.

This movie – this particular movie – couldn’t have come at a better time for China. Hollywood is in the midst of negotiating the terms of foreign (read: Hollywood) films’ market access to China. American studios find China’s protectionism exasperating on multiple levels, with the biggest complaints being (1) the quota system, which only allows 34 foreign films (largely US studio films) each year on a revenue-sharing basis (2) the low percentage of receipts allotted to the foreign studio (currently 25%) for such revenue-sharing films, and (3) the foreign studio’s inability to control the release date. The last point is more serious than might immediately be apparent – not only does the Chinese government determine when each film will be released (via a largely opaque process), it also imposes unofficial blackouts during which no new foreign films are allowed to be released.

Aside from discussions about WTO obligations and fair play, US studios’ best argument for expanding access to the Chinese film market has been an economic one: Chinese audiences want to see American movies (and don’t particularly want to see Chinese movies), and with thousands of new screens every year, Chinese movie theaters need movies people want to see. In other words, limiting the number of American movies hurts the Chinese economy.

Setting aside the fallacy that the Chinese government’s interests are aligned with those of Chinese theater owners, the success of Wolf Warrior 2 upends all of those arguments. Wolf Warrior 2 was released on the first day of a blackout period, and it is already the most successful movie in Chinese history. It is a Chinese-made movie, with purely (even exclusively) Chinese content, and Chinese theaters are raking in the money – and not having to send any of it overseas. The Chinese government will likely infer that Wolf Warrior 2’s success is not in spite of their protectionist policies, but because of them. And President Trump’s saber-rattling about a trade war isn’t likely to improve their attitude.

I certainly hope the U.S. negotiating team is able to make some headway, but U.S. studios and production companies shouldn’t assume anything. They need a backup plan, and right now the best one seems to be investing in and otherwise creating productions in China solely for the Chinese market. A number of studios and production companies are already going down this road, and I think it’s the smart play. Better to be an investor in the next Wolf Warrior than to be shut out completely.

[GeneChing]

‘Wolf Warrior II’s’ Massive Success Forces Studios to Rethink China Approach (http://variety.com/2017/biz/news/china-wolf-warrior-ii-1202543266/)
Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/wolf-warrior-ii.jpg?w=670&h=377&crop=1
COURTESY OF WEI HONG YUAN
AUGUST 31, 2017 | 10:00AM PT

As the Chinese box office sagged alarmingly for an entire year, from July 2016 to June 2017, filmmakers and studios in the Middle Kingdom began desperately searching for answers. Many concluded that bigger Chinese properties were the solution and banked on new, higher-quality franchises coming on stream in 2018.

No one was paying much attention to “Wolf Warrior II.” They are now.

Since its July 27 debut in China, the action thriller has confounded expectations to become a box office stunner. In less than two days, it surpassed the $88 million scored by the franchise’s first installment in 2015. Ten days later, it overtook last year’s sensation, “The Mermaid,” as China’s top-grossing film of all time. Now, its $810 million take after just five weekends has made “Wolf Warrior II” the second-highest-earning title in a single territory in history, behind “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” in North America.

In the process, it has sparked rethinking in both China and Hollywood over how best to approach and exploit the Chinese movie market, which is on track to become the world’s largest in the next few years. “Wolf Warrior II” shows just what a well-crafted Chinese film — made with some foreign help — can do.

The movie features a muscular, adrenaline-fueled story whose unstoppable hero is a former member of a fictitious Chinese special ops unit called the Wolf Warriors. The action takes place in an unnamed African country where China has built hospitals and provided factory jobs for the locals; the bad guys are revolutionaries and Western mercenaries. (If the politics sound jarring, just swap the nationalities.)

Chinese audiences have responded strongly to the film’s patriotism and to the relentless action provided by former martial arts star Wu Jing as both director and protagonist.


“China has found its ‘Rambo.’ This is definitely an important event.”
RANCE POW, ARTISAN GATEWAY
“It is a feel-good story for the Chinese population. The hero is a military guy, and the message is that he treats everyone equally. It is very modern, there’s a touch of comedy, and some 30% is spoken in English,” says Jeff Yip, business development director at The H Collective, a new U.S.-Chinese production and distribution firm. The company owns the rights to “Wolf Warrior II” for North America, where the film has made more than $2.3 million. A gross of $1 million is considered a hit for a Chinese movie Stateside, but the unparalleled performance of “Wolf Warrior II” in China has piqued greater interest. An Imax conversion that bowed Aug. 25 was given a limited outing in the U.S.

The movie isn’t the product of one of China’s mega-studios, such as Huayi, Bona, Enlight or China Film Group, though Wanda owns a small piece. Rather, it was conceived and controlled by Beijing Century and by Wu, who started planning a sequel immediately after the first film, made for $5 million, hit pay dirt.

Hollywood talent has contributed significantly to the second film. Increasing the budget to $30 million allowed Wu to bring in Joe and Anthony Russo as consultants and to pay for better production values. With the Russos came stunt director Sam Hargrave (“Captain America: Civil War”), composer Joseph Trapanese (“Tron: Legacy”) and a largely foreign sound unit. American actor Frank Grillo stars alongside Wu.

The early signs weren’t promising. In May, a trailer launch was criticized for seemingly borrowing footage from “X-Men: First Class.” Even the film’s July 27 opening date seemed questionable, since it clashed directly with the government-backed propaganda movie “The Founding of an Army,” from director Andrew Lau. With the nationalistic plot of “Wolf Warrior II,” the two films seemed to appeal to the same constituency.

But “Wolf Warrior II” has left “The Founding of an Army” in the dust, showing that support from the Chinese government isn’t everything. “What really worked for ‘Wolf Warrior II’ was combining the best elements of action and international stars in service of something enjoyable to Chinese audiences,” says Yip.

The film was no doubt helped by being released during the summer blackout period, when major foreign movies are banned from domestic release. But that’s only part of the equation.

“The filmmakers worked really hard to make this a quality production,” says Jane Shao, co-founder of exhibition chain Lumiere Pavilions. “At base, this is a hero movie no different from a Western or a Jackie Chan or Jet Li martial arts movie of old.”

For Hollywood, the lesson is that its obsession with China’s quota on imported films, now the subject of a new round of talks by U.S. and Chinese negotiators, is potentially shortsighted. Instead, Hollywood studios looking to bolster their bottom lines might want to redouble efforts to back local filmmakers in China and invest in high-quality local content, not just in their own tentpoles.

“China has found its ‘Rambo.’ We expect more movies in this space,” says Rance Pow, founder/CEO of consultancy Artisan Gateway. “This is definitely an important event.”

Always trying to make films that work in both the U.S. and China might be a futile exercise. Many variations on the theme have been tried: overblown co-productions; Hollywood films that try to cater to Chinese tastes but still get it wrong; Chinese pictures that wrongly assume that the casting of a Western star will translate into overseas sales.

The astounding box office performance of “Wolf Warrior II” suggests that in a country of 1.3 billion people, succeeding on home turf alone can be more than enough.

At this point, is it wise to make assumptions about what China might assume?

WolfvWarrior 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2) & Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

3 Reasons China’s Box Office Soared This Summer While the US Flopped (http://www.thewrap.com/reasons-china-box-office-soared-this-summer-while-us-flopped/)
One hit movie and a fanbase with diverse tastes helped the Middle Kingdom get back on its double-digit growth track
Matt Pressberg | September 25, 2017 @ 5:35 PM

https://www.thewrap.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Wolf-Warrior-2-Character-1.jpg

This summer, a high-octane action movie captivated audiences in one of the world’s largest film markets, grossing nearly $1 billion and changing the trajectory of its box office forecast. And while that seems like welcome news for the slumping U.S. box office, it wasn’t: the movie was China’s “Wolf Warrior 2.”

“Wolf Warrior 2,” directed by and starring Wu Jing, made more than $800 million in China at the same time U.S. box office was struggling through its worst summer slump in more than a decade. (New Line’s record-setting “It” helped the domestic box office bounce back in September, but it remains down nearly 5 percent year-to-date.)

At the Future of Asia Conference put on by the Los Angeles World Affairs Council in Santa Monica earlier this month, Leeding Media CEO David U. Lee said the Chinese box office could finish up as much as 20 percent this year, a welcome performance after the world’s fastest-growing movie market flatlined last year following years of double-digit growth. Jonathan Papish, a box office analyst at China Film Insider, said that growth rate is possible if including online ticketing fees, but even adjusting for those, it should still finish up by a healthy mid-teens percent.

With all the doom and gloom in Hollywood, here’s how China held strong:

Sometimes it only takes one movie

“The difference between this year and last can mainly be attributed to the success of ‘Wolf Warrior 2,'” Papish told TheWrap. “In fact, removing its current gross (5.28 billion yuan) would actually place this year’s box office behind last year’s, excluding ticketing fees.”

“Wolf Warrior 2” passed Stephen Chow’s “The Mermaid,” which was released last February, to become China’s all-time highest-grossing movie. “The Mermaid” got 2016 off to a strong start, but a combination of reduced ticket subsidies and a weak local slate turned it into a major disappointment, as the Chinese box office grew just 4 percent last year, and actually declined in dollar terms, as the Chinese yuan weakened against the U.S. currency.

But “Wolf Warrior 2’s” record-setting performance, which came during the busier summer season, almost single-handedly gave 2017 a different ending.

China isn’t as reliant on one type of film as the U.S. has become

In 2015, it took “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” to propel the domestic box office to a record high. Last year, five of the 10 highest-grossing films in North America were either “Star Wars” or superhero movies. And even this year, the industry is largely counting on “Star Wars: The Last Jedi,” along with comic-book adaptations “Thor: Ragnarok” and “Justice League” to rescue a brutal 2017.

But despite China being a much less mature movie market, its audiences seem to have a diversity of tastes that make it less reliant on droids and Avengers than the U.S. is.

Hollywood continues to count heavily on caped crusaders and their ilk, with Warner Bros. “Wonder Woman,” Disney’s “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” and Sony’s “Spider-Man: Homecoming” making up three of the top 5 domestic films thus far this year. But it’s a different story in China, where a mix of homegrown films and non-comic book based movies have been among its strongest performers.

“If ‘War for the Planet of the Apes’ eventually surpasses ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming,’ a Hollywood superhero film will fail to rank in the top 10 highest-grossing imports of the year for the first time since 2003,” Papish wrote earlier this month.

Hollywood hits disappointed at home, but imports soared in China

“Wolf Warrior 2” was easily the major story behind China’s box office turnaround, but imports also did their duty.

Hollywood’s superhero hits didn’t do the numbers in the Middle Kingdom they did at home, but domestic disappointments like “Transformers: The Last Knight” and “xXx: Return of Xander Cage” soared in China. And Indian film “Dangal,” which made just $12.4 million domestically, hauled in a whopping $193 million in China.

“2017 has been a stronger year for imported films,” Papish said. “Can’t [just] say Hollywood because ‘Dangal’ is currently the 3rd highest-grossing import of the year.”

China still needs Hollywood films to fill its ever-expanding supply of theaters. But the good news for its filmmakers — potentially bad news for Hollywood — is that its box office no longer lives and dies with them.

Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising) due to WW2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2)

Transformers: The Last Knight (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?47070-Transformers&p=1298615#post1298615)
xXx: Return of Xander Cage (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1336)
Dangal (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70365-Dangal)

[GeneChing]

I've been wondering when corruption would become more prominent in this. So much quick money at play - seemed inevitable.


Hollywood Cheated of Millions at China Box Office, MPAA Audit Finds (Report) (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/hollywood-cheated-millions-at-china-box-office-mpaa-audit-finds-report-1045150)
8:09 AM PDT 10/3/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn5.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/08/thr_china_agnew_-_h_2017.jpg
Zhang Peng/LightRocket (Money), Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post (Trump), Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg (Xi), Chip Somodevilla (Scaramucci), Win McNamee (Schumer), Han Haidan/CNSPHOTO/VCG (Wang), all Getty Images

PricewaterhouseCoopers has discovered that ticket sales in China were underreported by as much as 9 percent last year.
Chinese cinemas have been skimming millions in ticket revenue from the Hollywood studios, an MPAA audit of the country's massive theatrical film market has found.

According to a Wall Street Journal report published early Tuesday, PricewaterhouseCoopers, investigating on behalf of the MPAA, has discovered that ticket sales in China were underreported by as much as 9 percent in 2016, which amounts to at least $40 million in missing revenue for the six major U.S. studios.

International film studios are currently entitled to a 25 percent share of box-office revenue in China, and the U.S. studios' films officially grossed $1.87 billion there last year — which leaves a take-home of about $470 million.

With China expected to surpass North America as the world's largest theatrical market sometime in the next five years, U.S. studios have grown increasingly reliant on strong returns from the Middle Kingdom to prop up the global performance of their biggest tentpoles. For example, both Universal and Paramount's biggest movies this year — The Fate of the Furious and Transformers: The Last Knight, respectively — earned more in China than in North America.

But Chinese cinemas have been known to employ various tactics to game the system. The MPAA's auditors found incidences of fraud during their inquiry, including unreported screenings, under-reported audience sizes and ticket sales miscategorized as concessions, the Journal's sources, which were unnamed, said.

The MPAA's member studios have long been concerned about skimming in China. Under mounting pressure from the lobbying group and U.S. trade officials, China secretly agreed in 2015 to allow the first independent box-office audit to take place within its borders, sources told The Hollywood Reporter at the time. That investigation finally got underway this past summer.

PWC reviewed Hollywood's 29 biggest movies released in China in 2016, and investigated 125 screens run by 27 different cinema chains in cities large and small across the country, the Journal's sources close to the auditors said. The results were then used to generate estimates for China's 43,000-plus screens, which is the world's largest count.

The exercise is understood to be just the first of more MPAA audits to come.

The Hollywood audits are involved in the ongoing renegotiation of the U.S. film industry's terms of doing business in China. A prior five-year trade agreement — which covered everything from how many U.S. movies China accepts into its cinemas to what share of revenue Hollywood studios are entitled to take home — expired in February. Officials from the two nations are now at work on a new agreement, with the U.S. side pushing for greater market access and a fairer playing field, and the Chinese looking to safeguard the development of their still-nascent domestic industry.

Beijing is known to share Hollywood concerns about the malfeasance within its multiplexes, as fraud cuts into the earnings of local studios, too. Earlier this year, Chinese regulators named, shamed and punished 326 local cinemas for cooking the books — the first major enforcement of a new national film law, which went into effect in March.

[GeneChing]

Remember all the reports on the previous page about how the Chinese film market was in a slump? :rolleyes:


China Box Office Forecast to Surge to $8.3B in 2017 (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-forecast-surge-83b-2017-1050632)
12:55 AM PDT 10/20/2017 by Patrick Brzeski

http://cdn2.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/08/232000183-h_2017.jpg
Courtesy of Well Go USA
'Wolf Warrior 2'

The total would represent growth of 20 percent for the year, a major comeback over 2016, when growth slowed to 3.7 percent.

China's movie box office is expected to surge 20 percent-plus in 2017, hitting a record total of $8.31 billion (55.0 billion yuan), the country's media regulator said Friday.

In yuan terms, the figure would be up 20 percent, while the growth in dollar terms would hit 26 percent.

The sizable expansion would mark a major turnaround from 2016, when tickets sales grew by just 3.7 percent to $6.58 billion (45.7 billion yuan) after averaging 35 percent yearly gains for a decade.

The 2017 forecast was made by Zhang Hongsen, vice minister of the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television, during a press conference on the sidelines of China's 19th Party Congress, Reuters reported.

"The rapid development of the film industry has been a big bright spot for China’s culture industry,” Zhang said.

The return to double-digit growth would put China back on track to overtake North America as the world's largest box-office territory within a handful of years. North American box office revenue grew by 2.1 percent in 2016, settling at $11.36 billion.

A sizable chunk of China's gains were driven by the historic success of local action flick Wolf Warrior II, which brought in $863 million over the summer. No Chinese film has ever earned more, and only J.J. Abrams' Star Wars: The Force Awakens exceeded it in a single market, grossing $936.6 million in North America in 2015.

Hollywood's biggest release in the Middle Kingdom so far this year has been Universal's The Fate of the Furious, which earned $392.8 million in April, an all-time record for an imported title.

[GeneChing]

NOVEMBER 5, 2017 8:00AM PT
Chinese Audiences Move Away From Hollywood Pictures (http://variety.com/2017/biz/markets-festivals/bad-genius-chinese-audiences-move-away-from-hollywood-films-1202606930/)
Mainland moviegoers are starting to embrace foreign films from countries other than the U.S.
By Vivienne Chow

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/11/afm-american-film-market-placeholder.jpg?w=700&h=393&crop=1
CREDIT: VARIETY

Hollywood blockbusters are still leading the way in China’s box office, but audiences living in the world’s second-largest film market have displayed signs of hunger for more diverse movie imports.

Indeed, foreign films from outside Hollywood have proved to be popular in China over the past year. The most recent example is Thai picture “Bad Genius.” The comedy drama about smart students making big bucks out of cheating at exams raked in 221 million yuan ($33.3 million) as of Oct. 23, 11 days after its opening in China, the highest-grossing Thai movie in the country.

But that has yet to beat Bollywood sports film “Dangal,” by Aamir Khan, which took nearly 1.3 billion yuan ($195.8 million) in China this year — the most popular non-Hollywood foreign film in China, currently ranking at 19th of the country’s list of all-time highest-grossing movies.

“Hollywood movies are still top choices for Chinese audiences, but now they want more,” says Gong Geer, a film producer in China.

While Hollywood blockbusters continue their status as mainstream entertainment, a look at box office receipts reveals the growing popularity of non-Hollywood foreign films.

Prior to the success of “Dangal,”the Japanese fantasy animated film “Your Name,” which was released at the end of 2016, earned $84 million at the box office, the highest-grossing non-Hollywood feature at the time.

Spanish thriller “Contratiempo,” which was released in September, made $25.6 million in China, a box office surprise considering a lack of publicity prior to its theatrical release. It surpassed “Spider-Man: Homecoming” five days after its opening. The film has earned high ratings among the audience, with a score of 8.7 out of 10 on Chinese movie website Douban.

Luc Besson’s “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets,” a French action sci-fi pic that bombed in the U.S., earned $61.8 million when it was released in China this summer, according to China movie website Mtime.

And according to China movie website Yiyuguancha, as of Sept. 22, 33 import films totaled $723 million in the box office in 2017. The 19 non-Hollywood imports accounted for $519.7 million, 70% of the total box office in 2017 as of the time the report was released.

On the other hand, Hollywood films have not performed as well as expected. “Transformers: The Last Knight” earned $22.5 million, half of what it was predicted. “The Lost City of Z” pulled in just $1 million, an embarrassing flop.

Chinese critic Hong Shui wrote that audiences are growing tired of formulaic Hollywood blockbusters. Such movies are also losing out in public ratings on movie websites such as Douban and MTime.

More non-Hollywood fare will most likely make its way to China. Leomus Pictures CEO Qiu Jie told Chinese media that new films different from Hollywood blockbusters will be what audiences really want.

Gong adds that when audiences see Hollywood films the expected their money to be well-spent. But when it came to other foreign films, they’re more open-minded. “Audience respect quality films,” he says.

We've talked about Dangal (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70365-Dangal). Anyone see Valerian?

[GeneChing]

CHINA'S ANSWER TO RAMBO
China’s box office is setting new records—with a bit of Hollywood help (https://qz.com/1134905/wolf-warrior-2-helped-chinas-box-office-to-new-records-in-2017/)

https://qzprod.files.wordpress.com/2017/11/ap_17222191467777-e1511284671704.jpg?quality=80&strip=all&w=1600
The number one movie in China. (AP Photo/Andy Wong)

WRITTEN BY Ashley Rodriguez
OBSESSION Glass
3 hours ago

China’s biggest movie of the year wasn’t a popular Western actioner like the Fast & Furious and Transformers films. It was Wolf Warrior 2, a homegrown action sequel about a Chinese special forces agent who comes out of retirement to fight Western mercenaries.
With $854 million at the Chinese box office, the movie is now the second highest-grossing of all-time in a single market. Only Star Wars: The Force Awakens, which earned $937 million in North America in 2015, has done better.
It also helped China’s box office cross a new threshold. On Nov. 20, the box office surpassed 50 billion yuan ($7.5 billion) for the first time in a single year, said the state authority.
This comes a year after sagging growth had filmmakers and studios worried that China’s decade of average annual box-office growth of at least 35% was over. In 2016, the total box office grew 3.7% year over year, compared to 48% the prior year. But the world’s second-largest movie market appears to be getting back on track.
After a disappointing summer, the North American box office is down 4% from last year at $9.38 billion through Nov. 19. Tickets sold are also down 7% around 1.05 billion, Box Office Mojo estimated. That’s compared to a 15% increase to 1.4 billion admissions in China. There, movies that bombed with US audiences, like Transformers: The Last Knight, still prevailed.
And while Wolf Warrior 2 is pure hyper-nationalist China, it did have a bit of help from the Americans.
How Hollywood aided “Wolf Warrior 2”
Called China’s answer to Rambo, the patriotic movie had its fair share of Western influences. The sequel’s larger, $30 million budget afforded it input from Marvel directors Joe and Anthony Russo, from Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War, Variety reported. The brothers consulted on the film, US actor Frank Grillo played the villain, and it had an American stunt director and composer.
Hollywood has been collaborating more with China’s growing movie business. Hollywood studios have worked with Chinese partners to add subplots that appeal to local audiences and meet the government’s strict regulations for movies like Iron Man 3 and The Great Wall. And Chinese filmmakers are leaning on Hollywood to help them make movies with broad international appeal.
To aid its ailing box office last year, China’s government relaxed its quota on foreign films. It released 38 instead of 34 that year, the majority of which were from the US. The US and China—the biggest export market for Hollywood films—are due to re-negotiate the quota this year.
The country also imposes blackout periods during busy times like the summer months, when only local films can be screened. That propped up domestic releases like Wolf Warrior 2 and The Founding of an Army.
But the quotas and blackouts historically guaranteed that Chinese films, including co-productions with Hong Kong or American partners, accounted for 60% of the overall box office. And the government seems to be easing off that, too. So far in 2017, Chinese films made up about 52%, down from around 58% in 2016.


Top-grossing 2017 films in China, through Nov. 19 (https://www.theatlas.com/charts/BkjIkyGgM)
Wolf Warrior 2 $854 m
The Fate of the Furious 393
Never Say Die 332
Kung Fu Yoga 255
Journey West: The Demons Strike Back 240
Transformers: The Last Knight 229
Dangal 193
Pirates Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales 172
Kong: Skull Island 168
xXx: The Return of Xander Cage 164


State regulators expect China’s box office to finish 2017 with 55 billion yuan, a 20% lift from last year. In the US, all eyes are on Star Wars: The Last Jedi to save 2017.

A good overview on Wolf Warrior 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2) and the effect it's had on on Chollywood's rise (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising). We've discussed most of the Top Grossing films listed above, except Kong & Pirates I think.

[GeneChing]

How Hollywood Film "Fatigue" Is Impacting China (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/how-hollywood-film-fatigue-is-impacting-china-1064173)
6:00 AM PST 12/11/2017 by Karen Chu

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/12/chongqi_mixc_palace_cqmc_-_h_2017.jpg
Courtesy of EDKO

"All the sequels are boring people," says one insider as Hong Kong readies for CineAsia, an annual industry confab taking place this year from Dec. 11-14.

One of the earliest exhibitors to invest in movie theaters in China, the Broadway Cinema chain is now enjoying massive growth. Operated by Edko Films and headquartered in Hong Kong, Broadway is a premium brand that owns 47 cineplexes spread around first- and second-tier Chinese cities. On the eve of CineAsia, Edko CEO Tessa Lau talked to THR about why some Hollywood films don't work in China, the "irrational" actions of theater owners and the "hijacking" of the local exhibition industry.

All of Broadway's multiplexes are located in China's first- and second-tier cities, which some say are now saturated. Is there any plan to develop into third- and fourth-tier cities or rural areas?

We mostly follow wherever the property developers go since almost all cinemas in China are located in shopping malls. If the property developers build malls in the rural areas, then we will expand into those areas.

Do you think rural audiences will embrace Hollywood releases?

It depends on the type of movie. There seems to be a type of fatigue in recent years for Hollywood movies. It's because all the sequels are boring people. But there is actually little to fear for the "muscular" Hollywood films and animations. In 2015 and 2017, basically whenever a Fast and Furious installment was released, it soared to the top of the box-office chart. And in the past, in the 1980s, the Rambo films and the like did well around the world. So it showed that rural audiences, relatively unaccustomed to Western influences, enjoy the masculine Hollywood movies as much as the urban ones. But Hollywood dramas, comedies and animations that require some thinking, such as Inside Out, don't translate as well.

What is the downside of the massive theater growth in China?

Fierce competition between cinema operators, especially when some of them are irrational. There is the unique phenomenon of diminishing ticket prices in China — the price falls year after year, and you can't find that anywhere else in the world. It's because of the irrational operating model of some of the cinema operators — they cut the price to attract audiences. And the ticket subsidy by the e-commerce giants, which started in 2015, has deeply hurt the Chinese exhibition industry.

The subsidies greatly boosted the overall box office and admissions in 2015, but cutting the subsidies impacted box office negatively last year.

They don't need to subsidize movie tickets anymore because they already have the market share and have the data of the audience who downloaded their payment gateways. The e-commerce giants are asking the exhibitors and film producers to pay an exorbitant amount of money to advertise on their movie apps. This is what we call the "hijacking" of the cinema industry in China. Now, almost 80 percent of the audience in China buys movie tickets through these apps. Armed with the audience data, they can do whatever they want. They can promote a movie to hundreds of millions of people [simply] with the touch of a button.

Interesting on rural development. I hadn't considered that so, but it's a major factor.

[GeneChing]

Box-office hits suggest Jackie Chan is master of China zeitgeist (http://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/arts-music/article/2125785/box-office-hits-suggest-jackie-chan-master-china)
Actor’s roles defeating foreigners nicely follow the narrative in an enormous market that welcomes Chan far more than Hong Kong does
BY CLARENCE TSUI
28 DEC 2017

https://cdn2.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/styles/landscape/public/images/methode/2017/12/28/2d36b3a2-dfcd-11e7-af98-bc68401a7f65_1280x720_120456.JPG?itok=hOf3G7L2
Jackie Chan in his newest release, Bleeding Steel, predicted to be another big earner at the Chinese box office.

Looking back on 2017, the Hong Kong film industry’s premier torch-bearer was indisputably Kara Wai Ying-hung, who began the year by scoring her third best actress prize at the Hong Kong Film Awards, this time for her role in Happiness (2016), and ended the 12 months by winning a Golden Horse for her perfor*mance as a manipulative, well-connected Taiwanese matriarch in this year’s The Bold, the Corrupt and the Beautiful .

In between, Wai not only salvaged uneven action thriller Mrs K with her agile turn as a homemaker confronting her criminal past, but also appeared in Luc Besson-produced fantasy blockbuster The Warriors Gate , decidedly trashy Death Ouija 2, romcom 77 Heartbreaks and suspense thriller The Mysteries Family.

Only one other Hong Kong movie veteran has been able to match the 57-year-old in terms of productivity in 2017. Across the border, an actor six years her senior has graced cineplexes as a treasure-hunting archaeologist in India, a patriotic partisan in China and a grieving father avenging his daughter’s death in a terrorist attack in Britain. He has also lent his voice to Mandarin versions of The Lego Ninjago Movie and BBC documentary Earth: One Amazing Day.

https://cdn3.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/images/methode/2017/12/28/bd4bc9be-dfcd-11e7-af98-bc68401a7f65_1320x770_120456.JPG
Kara Wai (left), Ke-Xi Wu, and Vicky Chen in The Bold, the Corrupt, and the Beautiful . But for Chan, Wai would be Hong Kong’s busiest film star this year.

As you’re reading this, he has two films on release, playing a special agent in futuristic action-thriller Bleeding Steel , and an old shopkeeper in the Chinese adaptation of Japanese novel Miracles of the Namiya General Store .

If not for a shuffle of China’s film release schedules, he would have scored a hat-trick of appearances during the lucrative New Year’s Day holiday with a cameo in Dante Lam Chiu-yin’s military blockbuster Operation Red Sea.

Take a bow, Jackie Chan.

The action-film icon has had an extremely busy 2017, not appearing in as many films in a single calendar year since 1985, when he enjoyed leading roles in five blockbusters that grossed a total of HK$120 million at the local box office – a figure which, even before being adjusted for inflation, remains astounding. Four of those films – My Lucky Stars; Twinkle, Twinkle Lucky Stars; Police Story; and Heart of Dragon – ended the year at the top of Hong Kong’s box office charts.

https://cdn2.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/images/methode/2017/12/28/c451bffc-dfcd-11e7-af98-bc68401a7f65_1320x770_120456.JPG
Jackie Chan in Miracles of the Namiya General Store.

Now perceived as passé and pompous in his home city, Chan – whose real given name, Kong-sang, translates as “born in Hong Kong” – appears in the news mostly for the wrong reasons. Once fawning over his every move and referring to him as Dai Gor (“big brother”), the local entertainment press now treats him with scorn: his frequent and invariably denigrating outbursts against Hong Kong have proven to be of much more interest than, say, his acceptance of an honorary Oscar.

Not that he seems to care, given the way he has endeared himself to consumers in China. His films Railroad Tigers (2016), Kung Fu Yoga (2017) and The Foreigner (2017) have generated 3 billion yuan (US$460 million) in ticket sales this year, with Bleeding Steel and Miracles of the Namiya General Store expected to add another billion.

If not for Jacky Wu Jing’s record-breaking Wolf Warrior 2 , Chan could easily have been China’s highest-grossing film star of 2017.

https://cdn3.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/images/methode/2017/12/28/313725fe-dfcd-11e7-af98-bc68401a7f65_1320x770_120456.JPG
Jackie Chan (right) in Railroad Tigers.

Far from being an anomaly, China’s embrace of Chan speaks volumes about consumption and behavioural patterns, his success illustrating China’s demand for globetrotting, sensationalist entertainment.

By any measure, Sino-Indian co-production Kung Fu Yoga is tacky and culturally tone deaf, with its comical rehashing of Indiana Jones tropes and warped caricatures of Indian culture. Released over the Lunar New Year holiday, the film eventually trumped Tsui Hark’s Journey to the West: Demons Strike Back at the Chinese box office, taking in nearly 1.75 billion yuan.

While Kung Fu Yoga might have benefited from its extended run in cinemas, as well as its release as China was courting India for the “Belt and Road Initiative”, China’s plan to grow global trade, there were many complimentary comments online about its car chases, slapstick-fuelled choreography (Chan still kicks people in the crotch), and exotic settings (India, Dubai) and characters (gaudy snake charmers and photogenic Indian actors).

https://cdn1.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/images/methode/2017/12/28/b86e99c6-dfcd-11e7-af98-bc68401a7f65_1320x770_120456.JPG
Jackie Chan (top, left) in a scene from Kung Fu Yoga.

Just as importantly, audiences appreciate how Chan’s heroes beat the living daylights out of foreign villains – a tendency, perhaps, that echoes China’s rise. He outwits Indian mercenaries in Kung Fu Yoga, dispatches inhuman Japanese soldiers in Railroad Tigers and runs rings around rogue paramilitary units and politicians in Northern Ireland in The Foreigner. In Bleeding Steel, Chan’s special agent is up against a cyborg played by Australian actor Callan Mulvey.

It’s easy to s******, but all this would seem like déjà vu to those who were around during Chan’s heyday of the 1980s and 90s. True to the vogue of that time, his Hong Kong block*busters could be as jingoistic as his newer China-oriented output: Chan lectures morals to corrupt expat police officers in Project A (1983), for example. He conquers Spanish hearts and cuisine in Barcelona-set Wheels on Meals (1984), and defeats a cult in Yugoslavia in Armour of God (1986). Remember Rumble in the Bronx (1995), with all those over-the-top gangsters? Then there was that battle with crooked CIA operatives in Rotterdam in Who Am I? (1998).

Ultimately, Chan’s films seem to say as much about the people making them as the people watching them – and the values with which they empathise. Maybe that’s where Chan’s relevance – for both industry researchers and sociologists – lies today: he is a barometer of who Chinese cinema-goers are, and of what they want.

Roll on then, Jackie.

Let's see now - we covered a lot of these. I'm only going to link the 2017 films because the old ones would be too much (and I luv Kara Hui aka Kara Wai Ying-hung)
Bleeding Steel (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69568-Bleeding-Steel)
Mrs K (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70438-Mrs-K)
The Warriors Gate (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?67413-Enter-the-Warriors-Gate)
Ninjago (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69595-Ninjago)
Earth: One Amazing Day (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70150-BBC-s-Earth-One-Amazing-Day-with-Jackie-Chan)
Namiya (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70610-Namiya-(%26%2335299%3B%26%2324551%3B%26%2326434%3B%26%233 6135%3B%26%2324215%3B))
Railroad Tigers (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68652-Railroad-Tigers)
Kung Fu Yoga (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68161-Kung-Fu-Yoga)
The Foreigner (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68698-The-Foreigner)
Wolf Warrior 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2)

And let's copy this to the Jackie Chan (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?41790-Jackie-Chan) because his impact on the whole Chollywood Rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising&p=1306584#post1306584) movement is something I've been on about for years here.

[GeneChing]

Part of the reason why it 'slowed dramatically last year' was because it was on such a ridiculous meteoric rise. Once the fervor cooled down, it appeared to slump, but really it just normalized. Regardless, the growth has continued. And someday, I'll have to change to title of my column. Told ya. Like that was hard to predict. You just gotta do the math... :rolleyes:


China Box Office Returns to Robust Growth in 2017, Hitting $8.6B (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-returns-robust-growth-2017-hitting-86b-1070895)
8:35 AM PST 1/1/2018 by Patrick Brzeski

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/08/232000183-h_2017.jpg
Courtesy of Well Go USA

China's all-time box-office champ, 'Wolf Warrior 2'

Hollywood had a particularly strong year in the market, with international movies accounting for 46 percent of revenue, up from a 42 percent share in 2016.
China's movie box office is back to a healthy state of expansion.

Total ticket sales for 2017 grew by 22.3 percent to reach 55.9 billion yuan ($8.59 billion), according to data released Monday by Beijing's top media regulator.

The solid performance puts China back on the path to overtaking North America as the largest theatrical film market in the world sometime in the next several years. The figure also stands in stark contrast to the downbeat 2017 performance of world's current No. 1 market: In North America, ticket revenue dipped 2.3 percent, according to comScore.

China's 2017 tally also represents a robust comeback from the market's shock correction of 2016, when local box-office growth abruptly stalled at just 3.7 percent after expanding by an average of 35 percent for more than a decade.

The 2017 results are particularly encouraging for Hollywood. International films — the bulk of them U.S.-made — claimed 46 percent of revenue in 2017, up from a 42 percent market share in 2016 and a 38.4 percent share in 2015.

China's big growth rate partly came courtesy of accounting changes by Beijing's bean counters, however. At the start of the year, China's media regulator — the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television — quietly began including the fees charged by online ticketing services when reporting box-office figures. Subtracting the online fees, China's 2017 ticket revenue grew by 13.45 percent, rather than 22.3 percent.

Regulators are believed to have begun including the fees both to offset slowing growth and to more accurately reflect the way movies are consumed in the country. Although North American box-office data does not include such fees, over 80 percent of all movie tickets are bought online in China, compared to less than 25 percent in the U.S. The online fees may go towards the bottom line of ticketing platforms rather than film studios, but they still represent millions in consumer spending on moviegoing.

A steady strengthening of the Chinese currency against the dollar during the year further tweaked the financial picture for the Hollywood studios. In U.S.-dollar terms, China's box office grew 30.5 percent from $6.58 billion in 2016 to $8.59 billion in 2017 (including ticketing fees).

The five biggest U.S. titles in China this year were Universal's The Fate of the Furious ($392.8 million, the most ever by a non-Chinese film), Paramount's Transformers: The Last Knight ($228.8 million), Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales ($172.3 million), Legendary's Kong: Skull Island ($168.2 million) and Disney's Coco ($177 million). Underscoring just how important the Chinese film market has become to the U.S. majors, all of those pics, except Coco, earned more in China than they did in North America (Coco earned $178 million in North America, but it remains on release in China, which will become the film's top market sometime in early 2018).

The year's biggest story in the Chinese industry, of course, was the heroic performance of patriotic action blockbuster Wolf Warrior 2, which collected a record $870 million — a height previously reached only by Hollywood's biggest hits. Other major earners were Never Say Die ($333.9 million, the most ever by a comedy in one market), Jackie Chan's Kung Fu Yoga ($254.5 million) and Tsui Hark's Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back ($239.5 million).

The Chinese marketplace also welcomed new diversity in 2017, as several non-Hollywood titles put up big numbers. Indian import Dangal, starring Amir Khan as a father who coaches his two daughters to become champion wrestlers, earned an astonishing $193.1 million. Thai high school thriller Bad Genius, meanwhile, earned $41.1 million, and Spanish crime film Contratiempo brought in $26 million (more than five times what it grossed in Spain).

The staggering growth of China's theatrical film sector over recent years — from $1.47 billion in 2010 to $8.6 billion in 2017 — has been fueled by breakneck cinema construction across the nation. Midway through the year, China overtook the U.S. to become the most-screened country in the world. Over 26 new movie screens, on average, were erected in China every day of 2017. The country now has 50,776 movie screens.

[GeneChing]

We'd do this here but we already have sitonmyfacebook (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Kung-Fu-Tai-Chi-Magazine/135964689362), where we propaganize ourselves. We don't need no government regulated propaganda. :rolleyes:


China to Select 5,000 Cinemas to Show Propaganda Films (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-select-5000-cinemas-nationwide-show-propaganda-films-1084201)
2:43 AM PST 2/13/2018 by Associated Press

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/07/the_founding_of_an_army_still_2.jpg
Courtesy of Media Asia
Chinese propaganda film 'The Founding of an Army'

In a throwback to language used during the era of Mao Zedong, the country's film regulator said the policy is intended to promote propaganda films to create a "people's theater front."

China plans to select 5,000 movie theaters across the country to screen propaganda films and will look to boost their box office with group sales, discounted tickets and other financial backing.

The number of theaters accounts for roughly 10 percent of China's total, with quotas issued for each major city, province and autonomous region.

A notice from the nation's film regulator said the policy is intended to promote specific movies at special times to create a "people's theater front," a throwback to language used during the era of Mao Zedong.

In keeping with the ruling Communist Party's latest initiatives, the policy intends to "guide thought and educate the people," said the statement, which was stamped Jan. 30. Copies of it were posted Tuesday to Chinese websites that cover the entertainment industry.

China, the world's second-biggest film market, saw movie ticket sales rise 13.5 percent last year to over $8.6 billion. Chinese-made movies accounted for 54 percent of ticket sales, with baldly nationalistic action thriller Wolf Warrior 2 topping the box office.

The ruling Communist Party is anxious to promote more productions with patriotic themes and exercises broad control over scripts and shooting permits.

It also routinely manipulates ticket sales and movie release dates, including limiting the number of foreign films that can be shown and banning them entirely for certain periods.

That helps pump up sales for domestic productions, although patriotic themes don't always win out. Recent successes have included films glorifying materialism and complex interpersonal relationships, such as the Tiny Times series.

As part of party leader and President Xi Jinping's ideological drive, the party has also sought to crack down on internet content deemed frivolous or immoral.

That includes online games such as the Japanese hit Travel Frog, although the denouncements appear to have done little to dampen public enthusiasm for them, and the authorities are eager to keep the internet open as a conduit for business.


Thread: Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Thread: Wolf Warrior 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2)

[GeneChing]

No distinction between Chinese and Hong Kong films anymore, says actor Jackie Chan (https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/03/08/no-distinction-chinese-hong-kong-films-anymore-says-actor-jackie-chan/)
8 March 2018 09:00 Kris Cheng 2 min read

Actor Jackie Chan has said there is no distinction between Chinese and Hong Kong films anymore.

Chan, a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, was attending a meeting of the conference’s arts group. He made his remarks in Beijing on Monday when asked about films co-produced between Hong Kong and the mainland.

“Now, we don’t say whether a film is a Hong Kong film or a Chinese film – Hong Kong films are Chinese films as well. It’s only about whether you are making local films – like in Shenyang you make Shenyang films, in Shandong you make Shandong films, many of them can’t get out of Shandong or Chaozhou,” he said.

https://www.hongkongfp.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/chrome_2018-03-07_18-22-13.jpg
Jackie Chan. Photo: i-Cable screenshot.

“There is only one kind of film called Chinese film, like Hong Kong Chinese film. There is local film, and Chinese film. Sometimes when we make Hong Kong films, they are only made for Hong Kong people, but Hong Kong people can also make Operation Red Sea for all Chinese,” he said, referring to the recent movie which earned over HK$3.7 billion at the box office.

“If you make a film about Wong Tai Sin, it may only be shown in Hong Kong – and will not have a good box office results in China, as people do not understand. But if you make something with a bigger perspective, like Operation Red Sea or Wolf Warrior, then you will go global.”

He said he will ask for the cancellation of quota limitations for Hong Kong actors and support staff in co-productions.

But Hong Kong director Philip Yung, whose film Port of Call won seven awards at the Hong Kong Film Award last year, disagreed with Chan.

“You can say we did not make films as good as the past, but you can’t really say we don’t have Hong Kong films anymore, can you?” he wrote on his Facebook page.

“Let us work harder then – if Hong Kong films are made well, the whole of Greater China will be honoured – is this not the case?” he added.

He posted several posters of renowned old Hong Kong films and said: “Look at these films – our films are always so dignified and colourful…”

Hong Kong film was at its peak during the golden age of Kung Fu flicks in the 70s and early 80s and then again in the late 90s as the political tensions mounted from the British handover of HK back to PRC. Now that PRC is such a film giant (thus this very thread) I get what Jackie is saying, because there are always local films. He just put it in a blunt manner that surely offends HK filmmakers who view Jackie as a sell out. But you gotta sell first, before you can sell out, and Jackie is a global star, arguably the only one outside of Bruce Lee, and maybe Jet and Donnie too.

[GeneChing]

Film, TV Escape Penalty as China Retaliates Against Trump’s Trade Tariffs (http://variety.com/2018/biz/asia/film-tv-escape-penalty-china-joins-trade-war-1202743484/)
By Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/09/chinese-president-xi-jinping.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: AP

America’s film and TV industries dodged a bullet Wednesday as China announced tariffs of about $50 billion against American goods. The measures were in retaliation against new U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports unveiled a day earlier.

China’s Commerce Ministry said it would increase import duties by 25% on 106 types of goods including soybeans, cars and light aircraft. The ministry said that it would announce the date for implementation separately, and that it would depend on the date that President Trump’s additional duties are imposed on Chinese exports to the U.S.

The maneuvers signal a significant lurch into a possible trade war between the world’s two largest economies. Trump has said he welcomes a trade war, contending that the U.S. loses out as a result of the Chinese trade surplus in physical goods. The U.S. has a surplus over China in service areas such as finance, software, and film and TV content.

The two countries are currently renegotiating a 6-year old agreement covering the film industry. They are believed to be close to a deal that would loosen China’s film import quotas, increase revenue-sharing terms for Hollywood rights owners, and likely increase the number of permitted distributors.

China’s retaliatory measures to date seem to have avoided the most headline-grabbing measures, such as penalizing the large passenger jets produced by Boeing or hitting out at Hollywood. China could be saving these for later if the trade dispute escalates.

For now, Beijing’s response seems targeted at Trump-voting constituencies. Soybeans are a major U.S. export to China and are predominantly sourced from red states on the U.S. political map. Other goods affected include beef, corn and orange juice.

The Chinese commerce ministry said that Tuesday’s U.S. moves were “an evident violation of the rules of the World Trade Organization.” It added that they threatened China’s economic interests and security.

Asian stock markets wobbled and the U.S. dollar weakened Wednesday. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 2.2% to 29,518, and the Dow Jones Shenzhen Index fell 1.1% to 502.05. Before the opening bell at 7.30 a.m. in New York, stock futures pointed to a 460-point drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average index.

FYI, China tariffs may have a profound effect on martial arts gear (http://www.martialartsmart.com/). Almost all martial arts equipment from any style is manufactured through China and steel might be affected. We know all the manufacturers and suppliers for our competition vendors. It's not that big a pool. This may cause price hikes across the board. :(

[GeneChing]

China, Japan to Sign Landmark Co-Production Treaty in May (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-japan-sign-landmark-production-treaty-may-1099610)
3:26 AM PDT 4/4/2018 by Patrick Brzeski

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2017/10/legend_of_the_demon_cat_still.jpg
New Classics Media/Kadokawa Corporation/Emperor Motion Pictures/Shengkai Film
'Legend of the Demon Cat'

The agreement is another sign that film-industry collaboration between the two Asian economic giants is gradually on the rise.
China and Japan, Asia's two largest economies, are set to sign a bilateral film co-production treaty when Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visits Tokyo in May, Japanese government sources told the Asahi Shinbun newspaper on Wednesday.

The policy is intended to deepen ties between the two countries through improved cultural cooperation. The signing will mark the 40th anniversary of the Japan-China Treaty of Peace and Friendship, which formally normalized relations between the two nations some three decades after World War II. It will be Japan's first international film cooperation pact.

Given the scale of the Chinese and Japanese film markets — the world's second- and third-largest box offices, respectively, trailing only North America — the new treaty could have far-reaching repercussions for both nations' film industries, as well as the regional movie sector at large.

Co-production treaties typically entail mutual access to national incentives and subsidies, and greater market access on each side. Such state-level partnerships also ease the permissions process for receiving filming permits, work visas and moving filmmaking equipment across borders. In China's case, co-production status also entails exception from Beijing's strict quota on film imports, which could be a considerable boon for Japanese film producers.

Often pitted as regional geopolitical rivals — owing to territorial disputes and the painful legacies of WWII — Japan and China have experienced a relative uptick in cultural relations in recent years, with local filmmaking getting increased exposure on one another's screens. Japanese animated film Your Name completed a history-making run in the Middle Kingdom in 2017, pulling in $83.7 million. Jackie Chan's Skiptrace and Chinese mega-blockbuster Wolf Warrior II, meanwhile, received theatrical releases in Japan last year.

During last year's Tokyo International Film Festival, an art-house film exchange program between Japan and China was initiated. Soon after, 10 Japanese titles, including Naomi Kawase’s Radiance and Daihachi Yoshida’s A Beautiful Star, began screening in succession in Chinese cities. Japan began reciprocating in March with the limited release of 10 Chinese films in Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya.

Last year also saw the release of the most high-profile Japan-China co-production to date, Legend of the Demon Cat, a fantasy mystery film directed by China's Chen Kaige and scripted by Japanese writer Yoneyama Mineo.

Japan has invited Chinese Premier Li for a formal state visit next month to coincide with a trilateral summit with South Korea. Many have interpreted the overture as a sign of Tokyo's increased push to improve ties with Beijing.

I still want to see Legend of the Demon Cat (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69825-Legend-of-the-Cat-Demon).

[GeneChing]

APR 3, 2018 @ 01:00 PM 11,246 The Little Black Book of Billionaire Secrets
Box Office: China Powers 'Ready Player One' Past $200 Million (https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2018/04/03/box-office-china-powers-spielbergs-ready-player-one-past-200m/#28a9941944b6)
Scott Mendelson , CONTRIBUTOR
I cover the film industry.
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

https://thumbor.forbes.com/thumbor/960x0/smart/https%3A%2F%2Fblogs-images.forbes.com%2Fscottmendelson%2Ffiles%2F2018% 2F04%2FMV5BMTU4Nzc3Mzg1M15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwNTI0MjQ xNTM%40._V1_SX1777_CR001777744_AL_-1200x675.jpg
Warner Bros.
'Ready Player One'

Ready Player One earned another $5.25 million on Monday, a drop of 53% from Sunday, bringing its five-day domestic cume to $58.96m. That 53% drop is right in line with (for example) Batman v Superman (-55% during the first Monday of Spring Break), although Ready Player One was a lot leggier (and had better buzz/reviews) over the course of what turned out to be a four-day opening weekend. Oh, and it has earned another $9.8m in China, which is a drop of just 57% from Sunday, compared to Coco (-65%), The Last Jedi (-70%), Black Panther (-68%) and Pacific Rim: Uprising (-70%).

So, yeah, with $181 million worldwide as of Sunday, another $9.8m Monday in China (plus whatever it did yesterday, since yesterday was "Tuesday" in China), $5.25m in North America and whatever it made overseas since Sunday, Ready Player One has crossed the $200m mark at the worldwide box office. It's playing ridiculously well in China, and there's already talk of a run like Zootopia ($235m in 2016) in what is about to become the biggest moviegoing marketplace in the world. It's also the third time in a row that a day-and-date China/US release resulted in a much bigger opening for China than for North America.

If you recall, Tomb Raider snagged a $23 million domestic bow but a $40m Fri-Sun opening in China toward a current $78m cume. Pacific Rim: Uprising earned $28m in its domestic Fri-Sun opening weekend while opening with $63.5m Fri-Sun debut for a current (and swiftly dropping) $90m cume. And now Ready Player One opened with $41m in North America (over its Fri-Sun debut) but $62m in China. This difference is that Ready Player One pulled a whopping 4.26x weekend multiplier and seems primed for a longer run.

Most Hollywood offerings of late (save for Coco) have opened big but then quickly vanished while Chinese moviegoers spent their money on local biggies like Operation Red Sea ($564 million in China alone) and Detective Chinatown 2 ($535m). It's no secret that most Hollywood movies aren't terribly leggy in China (Warcraft was more frontloaded in China than in North America), which is as much about much of the demand being filled on opening weekend and a near-weekly schedule of new biggies (sound familiar?). So that Ready Player One has even the potential for long legs is interesting, especially considering that Chinese moviegoers aren't as obsessed with 1980's Hollywood pop culture.

Now, to be fair, we're probably looking at a domestic finish of $125-$150 million, which is solid by today's standards but not necessarily a windfall for a $175m Warner Bros./Village Roadshow production. That will still, shockingly, make it the second-biggest domestic grosser of 2018. And when it passes the $369m global total of Fifty Shades Freed, it'll be the second-biggest Hollywood release of the year and still 3.4x smaller than Black Panther's current $1.275b gross.

A boffo run in China (where studios can get as little as 25% of the ticket sales) may merely be what separates Ready Player One from other acclaimed/buzzy $150-$175 million sci-fi fantasy actioners like Edge of Tomorrow ($370m worldwide in 2014) and Mad Max: Fury Road ($378m in 2015). Or it could really catch fire all over the world, in which case we're looking at a run not unlike Kong: Skull Island ($168m domestic/$168m in China/$566m worldwide on a $185m budget) or beyond.

But, more importantly, I would argue that the relative success (it's not like the film will be drowning in profits unless it really levels up) will be another chance to Warner Bros. to say that they are more than just DC Films and the various challenges those films have offered. And that's why, whether it makes a ton of money or merely breaks even, it's probably going to be a relative win even if it ends up grossing less than (for example) WB's Justice League or Paramount/Viacom Inc.'s Transformers: The Last Knight.

Reviewed on KungFuMagazine.com
Batman v Superman (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1290)
Black Panther (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1401)
Tomb Raider (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1408)
Justice League (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1389)
Pacific Rim (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1100): Uprising

Threads
The Last Jedi (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69288-Star-Wars-VIII-The-Last-Jedi)
Detective Chinatown 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70669)
Warcraft (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69449-Warcraft)
Mad Max: Fury Road (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70252-Mad-Max-Fury-Road)
Transformers (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?47070-Transformers): The Last Knight

[GeneChing]

JUNE 29, 2018 7:02AM PT
Local Hits Power Chinese Box Office to Strongest First Six Months Ever (https://variety.com/2018/film/news/china-box-office-best-first-six-months-ever-operation-red-sea-1202861553/)
By Vivienne Chow

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/02/operation-red-sea.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: T.NOR

Local blockbusters “Operation Red Sea” and “Detective Chinatown 2” powered the Chinese box office to its best-ever first six months of the year, with domestic productions accounting for nearly 60% of receipts, a significant increase from the same period last year.

According to the half-year industry report from China’s Ent Group, box office as of Friday for the first six months of 2018 totaled 31.6 billion yuan ($4.77 billion), with 889 million viewers, up more than 16% from the 27.2 billion yuan ($4.1 billion) recorded in the first half of 2017.

Domestic productions accounted for 18.8 billion yuan ($2.8 billion), or 59.6%, of the total. It was a huge increase from the 10.5 billion yuan ($1.59 billion) that accounted for 39% of total box office during the same period last year. Of the 40 movies released this year that have achieved more than 100 million yuan ($15 million), 18 were domestic productions.

The wild success of homegrown films was driven largely by military blockbuster “Operation Red Sea” and crime thriller “Detective Chinatown 2.” The former raked in more than 3.6 billion yuan ($544 million), becoming the second-highest grossing film of all time in China after last year’s “Wolf Warrior 2.” “Detective Chinatown 2” grossed 3.4 billion yuan ($513 million). Fantasy comedy “Monster Hunt 2” took in 2.2 billion yuan ($332 million).

Box office records show Chinese audiences continue to embrace foreign-language films produced outside of Hollywood, particularly Bollywood. So far this year, four of the five best-performing films imported into China for a flat fee (instead of for revenue-sharing) were Indian titles, with “Bajrangi Bhaijaan” on top, with 285 million yuan ($43 million). “Secret Superstar,” co-produced by Aamir Khan and imported on a revenue-sharing basis, scored the most out of all Indian films in China, earning 747 million yuan ($112.8 million).

China overtook North America as the world’s biggest movie market in the first quarter of 2018 but lost the throne mid-year, with North American box office hitting nearly $6 billion through June.

We have a thread on Detective Chinatown 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70669-Detective-Chinatown-2-(%26%2321776%3B%26%2320154%3B%26%2334903%3B%26%232 5506%3B%26%2326696%3B2)&highlight=detective) but not Operation Red Sea. I should start one...

[GeneChing]

JULY 8, 2018 3:52PM PT
China Box Office: ‘Dying to Survive’ Hits $200 Million After Opening Weekend (https://variety.com/2018/film/asia/china-box-office-dying-to-survive-200-million-opening-1202868253/)
By Patrick Frater
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/dying-to-survive-3-cr.jpeg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF HUANXI MEDIA

Chinese comedy drama, “Dying to Survive” opened with a massive $151 million to be the second largest film across the world this weekend. Its cumulative score by Sunday stands fractionally short of $200 million.

Based on real events, about a cancer survivor who took it on himself to import cheap drugs from India, the film is an unlikely winner in terms of subject matter. The film, directed by first time feature maker Wen Muye, changes the lead role to a non-patient, creating parallels with “Dallas Buyers Club.”

The picture got commercial traction by starring comedy titan Xu Zheng, veteran of “Lost in Thailand” and “Breakup Buddies,” and was powered by strong social media interest. It was the first Chinese-language film in 16 years to score 9 out of 10 on the Douban rating site. Adding to the film’s pedigree, Xu also co-produced with serial hitmaker Ning Hao (“Crazy Stone,” “No Man’s Land”). It premiered last month at the Shanghai International Film Festival.

After four days of successful previews, worth $48 million, the film was given a maximum push by exhibitors. Releasing with 167,000 screenings, it raced off to a $36.1 million Friday, according to data from Ent Group. On Saturday, it expanded to 187,000 sessions for $57.8 million, and followed that on Sunday with $57.2 million from 193,000 screenings.

The cumulative according to Ent was $199.7 million. The total included $5.7 million earned from 532 IMAX screens.

Chinese comedy, “New Happy Dad and Son 3: Adventure in Russia” took second place with a decent $10.5 million in three days.

Chinese action adventure, “Animal World” took third place with $8.57 million. After 10-days its cumulative is $64.3 million.

“Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom” took fourth place. It added $5.53 million for a 23-day score of $243 million.

“Incredibles 2” fared less well. Having never reached top spot, it sank to fifth place, scoring $3.30 million. Its cumulative after 17 days on release is $47.9 million.

No other film achieved more than $1 million over the weekend. “Escape Plan 2: Hades” was the best of the rest, scoring $330,000 for a 10-day total of $13.4 million.

I could've sworn I posted a review on Lost in Thailand. Animal World (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70681-Animal-World-(%26%2321160%3B%26%2329289%3B%26%2319990%3B%26%233 0028%3B)) is playing now in local theaters here in the SF Bay Area. I'm hoping to catch it but I don't think I'll have the opportunity.

[GeneChing]

JULY 19, 2018 11:04PM PT
Hollywood May Win Quota Concession in China (Report) (https://variety.com/2018/film/asia/hollywood-may-win-quota-concession-from-china-report-1202879328/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/jing-tian-the-great-wall.jpg?w=1000&h=562&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF UNIVERSAL

The quantity of Hollywood movies imported into China may increase under the terms of a trade deal.

The number of films able to be distributed in China on revenue sharing terms could grow from 34 at present to 44, according to news publication The Information. No sources are cited.

The publication also says that the bilateral talks, which started in February 2017, have been stalled since the Chinese New Year period in February this year.

The negotiations seek to renew and replace an existing deal which has been in place since 2012. In addition to the number of revenue sharing film imports, the negotiations cover matters including the size of the revenue share to be paid to rights owners, the number of films that can additionally be imported on flat fee terms, and other terms of trade.

Currently, Chinese government regulators choose which films are to be imported on revenue sharing terms, as well as their release dates. In most cases only state-owned companies are allowed to distribute the revenue sharing films in China. The U.S. Trade Representative, which heads negotiations for the American side, has sought greater flexibility on these matters.

All films released in China also need to be approved by censors, and to be cleared for audiences of all ages. That has meant significant cuts in some cases.

Of all the photos to use for this - the Great Wall (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?64980-The-Great-Wall). :p

[GeneChing]

JULY 29, 2018 7:29PM PT
China’s ‘Billionaire’ Earns $131 Million in Its Opening Weekend (https://variety.com/2018/film/asia/china-billionaire-131-million-opening-weekend-box-office-1202889516/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/hello-mr-billionaire-landscape-cr.jpg?w=993&h=559&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF STARRY ENTERTAINMENT

By far the biggest film of the weekend outside North America, China’s “Hello Mr. Billionaire” opened with $131 million in its home territory.

The comedy was far ahead of “Mission: Impossible – Fallout,” which earned $92 million in international markets, plus a further $61.5 million in North America, for a global total of $153.5 million.

“Billionaire” is the latest product from the team – director Yan Fei and writer Peng Damo – behind 2015 surprise hit “Goodbye My Loser.” It sees a failing soccer player challenged to spend $147 million (RMB1 billion) in a single month.

The film was released in competition with the fourth installment in one of Chinese film’s most beloved franchises, “Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings.” That scored $42.5 million over the same three-day period. On any other weekend, figures for “Detective Dee” might have been considered a triumph. But exhibitors quickly moved to support the runaway success of “Billionaire” over the fantasy adventure.

On Friday “Billionaire” scored $32.5 million from 138,000 screening sessions, according to data from Ent Group. On Saturday it was expanded to 155,000 screenings and earned $45.7 million. On Sunday, it went further, earning $51.8 million from 165,000 screenings.

“Detective Dee” delivered $15.8 million on Friday from 112,000 screenings. On Saturday it earned $14.2 million from 96,000 screenings and $12.3 million from 88,000 screenings.

The large complex of IMAX screens in China enjoyed a selection of three films. “Detective Dee” earned $2.5 million, while “Billionaire” and “Skyscraper” earned a combined $1.5 million.

“Skyscraper” was the No. 3 movie of the weekend in China. It earned $6.87 million, from a daily 20,000 screenings, for a 10-day cumulative of $85.8 million.

China’s “Dying to Survive,” another phenomenon at the Chinese box office, earned $4.65 million in its fourth weekend. After 23 days of release, “Dying” has earned $444 million, making it the third biggest film of this year and the fifth highest grossing film of all time in China.

Animation, “Animal Crackers” (aka “Magical Circus”) was the fourth-placed film and the only other this weekend to cross $1 million. It earned $1.22 million, for a nine-day cumulative of $6.75 million.

Mission Impossible (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68128-Mission-Impossible)
Goodbye Mr. Loser (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69015-Goodbye-Mr-Loser)
Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70263-Detective-Dee-The-Four-Heavenly-Kings)
Skyscraper (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69567-Skyscraper)

[GeneChing]

AUGUST 03, 2018 6:00am PT by Tatiana Siegel
Disney’s 'Christopher Robin' Won't Get China Release Amid Pooh Crackdown (Exclusive) (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/christopher-robin-refused-china-release-winnie-pooh-crackdown-1131907)

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/scale_crop_768_433/2018/08/chinese_leader_xi_jinping_and_winnie_the_pooh_in_d isneys_christopher_robin_-getty-h_2018.jpgChris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images; Laurie Sparham/Disney Enterprises, Inc.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Winnie the Pooh in Disney’s 'Christopher Robin'

A source pins the blame on the country’s crusade against images of the Winnie the Pooh character, which has become a symbol of the resistance with foes of the ruling Communist Party, namely Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
For only the second time this year, a Disney movie has been denied release in China. Christopher Robin, a live-action/CGI family film that stars Ewan McGregor, received a no-go from the country's film authorities.

No reason was given for the denial, but a source pinned the blame on China's crackdown on images of the Winnie the Pooh character, which is featured in a central role in Christopher Robin. Last summer, authorities began blocking pictures of Winnie the Pooh on social media given that the character has become a symbol of the resistance in China with foes of the ruling Communist Party, namely Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Bloggers have drawn comparisons between the pudgy bear and Xi, which has put the country's censors in overdrive. In June, Chinese authorities blocked HBO after Last Week Tonight host John Oliver mocked Xi's sensitivity over being compared to Winnie the Pooh.

But an insider counters that the decision likely has to do with the size and scope of the film given the foreign film quota and the fact that there are several new Hollywood tentpoles in the Chinese market right now.

The move won't likely hurt the PG film much at the box office. Christopher Robin is expected to make a solid debut in the U.S. when it opens today, earning between high $20 millions and $30 million. But it's still a small blow given that other recent movies from Disney's live-action division, like 2014's Maleficent and 2015's Cinderella, have made tidy sums in China ($48 million and $72 million, respectively).

Disney put Christopher Robin into development in 2015, long before Winnie the Pooh became a lightning rod for controversy in China. And shooting began on the Marc Forster-helmed film in summer 2017 in the United Kingdom, right around the same time the Chinese Winnie the Pooh crackdown began.

The only other Disney film this year to receive a no from China was A Wrinkle in Time. Disney will open Ant-Man and The Wasp in China on Aug. 24, when it will join other Hollywood tentpoles like Skyscraper and Mission: Impossible – Fallout.

I guess Xi hasn't read The Tao of Pooh. ;)

[GeneChing]

China just needs to get its propagandistic head out of its butt and make a movie that the world will enjoy.


Movie madness: Why Chinese cinemas are empty but full (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-china-blog-45318316)
By Stephen McDonell
BBC News, Beijing
31 August 2018

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Chinese movie theatres may appear to be sold out online, but in reality could be completely empty

For a country which will soon assume the mantle of the world's largest cinema audience, China comes out with a surprising number of big budget B-grade flops.

Some blame this on censorship, others on a lack of creativity but there are also those who see a more sinister force at work, which has nothing to do with film-making.

It also has nothing to do with selling tickets: at least not real ones.

Some investors are apparently financially backing movies with the sole goal of boosting their stock price that can shift on the perception of a movie's performance, irrespective of its true popularity.

Chinese film critic and industry observer Raymond Zhou has been digging into the darker side of film financing in his country.

"When you have a hit film, your stock price will go up several times in terms of market valuation compared with the grosses from the box office so some 'financial genius', came up with this idea: Why don't I have fake box office numbers so that I can make much more money from the stock market?" he said.

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Box office manipulation is a growing problem in China, says one film critic

I asked if it could really be true that producers were seeking to make money in ways that had nothing to do with putting bums on seats in theatres; nothing to do with making beautiful films?

"The natural way is to make a good movie and then your stock price will go up right?" he responded.

"But some people have reversed this equation. They have seen the rise of the stock price as the ultimate goal and have just used the making of the movie as an excuse."

Phantom tickets

So what is actually happening?

According to Chinese government investigators, certain production and investment companies have developed ways of faking box office results.

Then, if these publicly available figures appear to show that a film is doing well, people will buy shares in the companies which paid for the movie.

So a film might be on in the cinema and one of the companies which paid for it might buy out entire late night screenings. These will register as full houses when they are, in reality, entirely empty theatres.

Regulators have been catching onto this so producers have allegedly started just buying all the bad seats across many hours of screenings.

Yet the authorities have now worked out that if a showing is somewhat empty in the middle and for some reason all the seats around the walls have been purchased something must be amiss.

You might wonder, if box office manipulation has been a broad problem within the Chinese film industry, if it's still worthwhile financially.

How many hundreds of thousands of seats would a company need to buy to boost the figures enough to make a difference to its own stock price?

Well what if the cinema chain is also an investor? It can just sell itself the phantom tickets for free.

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Asura (L) was China's most expensive film, and one of its biggest flops

Cinema journalist John Papish is an expert in the Chinese box office and says considerable conflicts of interests in this country would be illegal in, say, the United States.

"An owner of an exhibitor can also distribute their own movies and use their cinemas as a launching pad," he said.

"They can manipulate the number of screenings in their own cinemas. Often times the third party ticketing apps also have their hands in the promotion of the films so they can push a film that they have an interest in; that they have invested in themselves."

So, in effect, a company - or connected companies - can distribute the film, have ownership of the theatres and then maybe also involve those selling the tickets. Even those apps rating the film could potentially have a financial stake.

'Cook the books'

Some films are also suspected of being used as a method of getting around China's laws designed to restrict capital flight.

This country has an annual international transfer limit per person of $50,000 (£38,921) without official clearance.

But you can "cook the books", according to Mr Zhou, if your movie is hiring international actors or even set and costume designers.

For example, in your budget, you might say you are paying a Hollywood star $10m but you're really only paying them $2m.

The other $8m you can transfer offshore without questions. And most importantly without the need to collect official Chinese receipts.

"Inside China we have this very strict invoice system," says Mr Zhou.

"Receipts can be checked and double checked using the super computers of the tax bureau. But once a lot of overseas talent or overseas service providers are involved then the system doesn't work and money can legally be moved off shore."

He thinks the authorities must be onto this and are likely to be looking at ways of closing the loophole.

This is not to say that China no longer has honest, committed filmmakers producing quality work.

The low budget drama "Dying to Survive", about a group of hapless criminals trying to smuggle cheap cancer drugs, has been described as showing what's best about this country's cinema, as well as being hugely popular.

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Dying to Survive has proven to be a box office hit

Yet the Chinese government knows there is something rotten going on which needs to be cleaned up.

The National People's Congress has introduced fines for misreported box office figures ranging from $7000 to $74,000 and the authorities are allowing the Motion Picture Association of America to use an accounting firm to audit box office data here.

Communist Party anti-corruption investigators say they are now chasing a high-profile producer, who they've accused of fraud, claiming that he is currently on the run in the United States.

However there still seems to be no move to break up the vested interests in Chinese movie making, which many analysts believe will continue to pump out poor quality fare as long as there is money to be made - irrespective of how many actually people go to see the film.

[GeneChing]

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018 12:01AM PT
China Box Office Leaps by $1 Billion Despite Mixed Summer (https://variety.com/2018/film/asia/china-box-office-leaps-1-billion-despite-mixed-summer-1202925585/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/dying-to-survive-3-cr.jpeg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF HUANXI MEDIA

China’s theatrical box office is running $1 billion ahead of last year, showing a gain of nearly 17% in the first months. That is despite an uneven summer period.

According to data from local consultancy and researcher Ent Group, Chinese cinema-goers spent $6.79 billion (including ticketing fees) in the first eight months of 2018. The figure compares with a like-for-like $5.79 billion in the same period of 2017.

The continuation of double-digit growth in 2018 puts the year-long stall, between July 2016 and June 2017, further in the past. That is good news for Chinese cinema operators who continue to add capacity. Ent Group data shows 57,300 screens in operation at the end of August, a 6% increase on the end-2017 figure of 53,900.

The summer period saw an 8% gain on last year with July and August together worth $2.03 billion, compared with $1.87 billion in 2017. (Measuring summer as June to August, the data shows a similarly modest 5% gain.)

The summer season was characterized by a succession of hits and an equally important number of flops. “Dying to Survive” with a $453 million gross, “Hello Mr Billionaire,” with $367 million and “The Island” on $188 million were among the season’s successes. The outright failures included “Asura” and “Europe Raiders,” while neither “Detective Dee: Four Heavenly Kings” not “Hidden Man” lived up to their billings. Throwback kung fu film, “Oolong Courtyard” also crumpled quickly.

The summer “blackout period,” the 4-6 week corridor in which Hollywood films are not allowed to open, was far less marked than normal. But getting a mid-summer release did not translate always into success. “Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again,” released on Aug. 3, and “Hotel Transylvania 3,” on Aug. 17, performed weakly.

Greater riches went to those films that mixed Chinese and U.S. content or investment. “The Meg,” structured as a co-production released on Aug. 10 and is a hit with $152 million to date. Legendary Entertainment’s “Skyscraper,” which is largely set in Hong Kong, but counted as an import, opened on July 20 and earned $98 million. Alibaba-backed “Mission: Impossible – Fallout” rounded off the summer with a smashing $77 million opening weekend.

The year to date figures also show Chinese films are increasingly measuring up to those from Hollywood. This is the first time that two Chinese films (“Operation Red Sea” and “Detective Chinatown 2”) have exceeded $500 million in the same year. Those two are also the ninth and tenth best-performing films worldwide so far this year.

Asura (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70661-Asura)
Europe Raiders (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70455-Europe-Raiders)
Detective Dee: Four Heavenly Kings (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70263-Detective-Dee-The-Four-Heavenly-Kings)
Hidden Man (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68590)
Oolong Courtyard (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70851-Oolong-Courtyard-Kung-Fu-School)

Operation Red Sea (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70858-Operation-Red-Sea)
Detective Chinatown 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70669-Detective-Chinatown-2)

[GeneChing]

SEPTEMBER 16, 2018 3:57PM PT
China Box Office: ‘L Storm’ Blows to $30 Million Opening
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/09/l-storm-1-cr.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF PEGASUS MOTION PICTURES

Hong Kong-made action-thriller “L Storm” topped the Chinese box office with an opening weekend score of $29.4 million. That gave it nearly 60% market share on another quiet weekend in Chinese theaters.

The weekend was characterized by the release of a large number of smaller titles into a window ahead of the Autumn Festival holiday blockbusters at the end of the month. Only “L Storm” made any significant impact, and was the third highest grossing film worldwide, according to ComScore.

The movie is a sequel to 2016 title “S Storm” and involves popular star Louis Koo as an anti-corruption investigator, this time apparently on the wrong side of the law. Directed by David Lam, it is produced by Raymond Wong’s Pegasus Films, and counts Huace Pictures, Wanda, and Er Dong Pictures as mainland Chinese co-producers. Data from Ent Group show it given a wide release, with over 120,000 screenings per day.

The top ten films earned a collective $51 million over the three days from Friday to Sunday. That was the fourth consecutive weekend decline and the third lowest grossing weekend of the year.

Tom Cruise-starring “Mission: Impossible – Fallout” slipped to second place and took $12 million in its third week on release. After 17 days, its cumulative in China is $162 million. Some $14 million of that has come from IMAX locations.

Japanese detective drama, “Destiny: The Tale of Kamakura” took third place for state-owned distributor Huaxia. Its opening score was $3.69 million. (Another Japanese film, romance “Let Me Eat Your Pancreas,” was also released this weekend. It scored $420,000, enough for tenth place.)

Fourth place belonged to U.S. prehistoric adventure “Alpha.” It earned $1.59 million in its second weekend, giving it a 10-day cumulative of $15.3 million.

“Ant-Man and the Wasp” earned $1.18 million in its fourth week on release in China. After 24 days it has earned $120 million.

Chinese action adventure, “Born to be Wild” was the only other film to exceed $1 million. It earned $1.02 million.

Next week “Wolf Warriors 2” gets a re-release. It will compete with Japanese animation “Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters” and Jia Zhang-ke’s “Ash is Purest White.”

I haven't seen S Storm or L Storm yet. Anyone?

[GeneChing]

I'm rooting for Shadow. ;)


China’s golden week: which movie will win big at the box office, Shadow, Project Gutenberg or Hello, Mrs Money? (https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/arts-music/article/2166033/chinas-golden-week-which-movie-will-win-big-box)
A small-time film production company may have found the formula for big-screen success with its comedy of manners starring Celina Jade
BY CLARENCE TSUI
28 SEP 2018

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As China’s National Day “golden week” begins, so does the latest battle for box-office supremacy. The holiday is, traditionally, a lucrative period for the Chinese film indus*try and many observers predict a race between Zhang Yimou’s epic Shadow and Felix Chong Man-keung’s action movie Project Gutenberg.

The former, a period piece in the same vein as Zhang’s international breakthrough Hero (2002), received criti*cal acclaim at the Venice and Toronto film festivals while the latter is by a director who counts the Overheard and Infernal Affairs (as screenwriter) trilogies among his works and boasts a stellar cast including Chow Yun-fat and Aaron Kwok Fu-shing.

Both films are bound to generate brisk business but the real deal lurks elsewhere. The winner, we predict, will be the feel-good film starring Hong Kong-born Celina Jade that is set in an exotic location, driven by an over-the-top narrative and filled with sensation*alist gags and one-dimensional characters.

No, we are not talking about Wolf Warrior 2 (2017), China’s highest-grossing film of all time, in which Jade stars as a United Nations doctor and which is taking a second stab at the box office after being re-released on September 19. Instead, the winner-in-waiting is a movie called Hello, Mrs Money, which, like Shadow and Project Gutenberg, hits mainland screens on September 30.

Set in a luxury resort in Malaysia, this comedy of manners involves a group of men who go to farcical lengths – including an extended gag in which one of them dresses up as a woman – in an attempt to swindle a rich widow (Jade) out of her fortune.

Before you brush it off as a crass mash up of Some Like It Hot (1959) and Tootsie (1982), it is worth noting the commercial pedigree of those behind Hello, Mrs Money. Originally a theatrical troupe specialising in comical plays aimed at festive audiences during the New Year holidays, Mahua FunAge has diversified into filmmaking with remarkable success.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MS7GTv1EaeE

Since 2015, the company has scored three major hits. Goodbye, Mr Loser (2015), Mahua FunAge’s debut film, about an unemployed musician who travels back in time to his teenage years, raked in 1.4 billion yuan. Its next film,Mr Donkey (2016) – a social satire about rural teachers securing state subsi*dies for their school by registering a donkey as a member of the staff – earned just 172 million yuan (US$25 million), but last year Mahua FunAge regained its touch with the comedy Never Say Die, which out*perform*ed its debut by earning 2.2 billion yuan.

Its latest comedy, this summer’s Hello Mr Billionaire, has grossed 2.5 billion yuan and counting. The film – about a failed footballer’s struggle to inherit a wealthy uncle’s fortunes – is still showing at a handful of cinemas in the mainland, more than two months after its release.

All the films are adaptations of Mahua FunAge’s own stage productions and were made with mainland audiences in mind. And unlike some of its comical peers – for example, Xu Zheng and his wanderlust-driven gag fests Lost in Thailand (2012) and Lost in Hong Kong (2015) – Mahua is not exactly clamouring for global exposure.

A wise move, that, because it won’t be long before someone discovers that Good*bye, Mr Loser is a copy of 1986 Hollywood comedy drama Peggy Sue Got Married. (Mahua FunAge was at least honest when it came to Hello, Mr Billionaire, which was credited as a remake of Walter Hill’s 1985 film Brewster’s Millions.)

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Chow Yun-fat (right) and Aaron Kwok in Project Gutenberg.

Mahua FunAge – whose Chinese name, Kaixin Mahua, translates as “Happy Doughnut” – is just the latest in a long line of canny operators cashing in on mass appeal. Its success is bizarre only in the fact that its silly and at times tasteless comedies have reigned supreme during a period of po-faced patriotism in public discourse.

Then again, maybe Mahua FunAge’s output fits rather than undermines the dominant national narrative: it’s worth remembering that Chinese authorities dialled down the rhetoric earlier this year by yanking propaganda film Amazing China from mainland screens before putting a halt to the film industry’s feeding frenzy for nationalistic war-drum movies in the wake of the success of Wolf Warrior 2 and Operation Red Sea. Even the masses seem to be experiencing patriotism fatigue, as shown by the withering online response to the re-release of Wolf Warrior 2.

Amid the China-United States trade war, as fears of an economic downturn deepen, comedies might be just what Beijing needs to appease public anxiety – and Mahua is dishing them out in spades. While its output can hardly be called ground**breaking, its conquest of Chinese hearts and minds – with the films bolstered by stage performances in nearly every provincial capital in the country – says much about the state of China today.

THREADS (COPIED):
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Shadow by Zhang Yimou (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70319-Shadow-by-Zhang-Yimou)

Films mentioned (for reference):
Wolf Warrior 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2)
Operation Red Sea (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70858-Operation-Red-Sea)
Goodbye, Mr Loser (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69015-Goodbye-Mr-Loser-%26%2322799%3B%26%2327931%3B%26%2329305%3B%26%2329 033%3B%26%2324817%3B)
Hero (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/magazine/article.php?article=531)

[GeneChing]

While I'm bummed that Shadow didn't out-perform Mrs. Money, take note of my comment on the Wolf Warrrior 2 thread (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70311-Wolf-Warrior-2&p=1305093#post1305093):

Celina Jade has tremendous potential to play to both sides of the Pacific. She's poised and one to watch.



SEPTEMBER 30, 2018 6:01PM PT
China Box Office: Celina Jade’s ‘Mrs. Money’ Wins Pre-Holiday Weekend (https://variety.com/2018/film/asia/china-box-office-celina-jade-mrs-money-pre-holiday-weekend-1202962729/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/09/money-03-cr.jpg?w=991&h=558&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF MAHUA FUNAGE

On a pre-holiday weekend, in which new films unusually were released Sunday instead of the normal Friday, “Hello Mrs. Money” starring Celina Jade topped the Chinese box office. Zhang Yimou’s “Shadow” took the second spot.

Their first day of release gave “Mrs. Money” $16.8 million, and “Shadow” $10.4 million, according to data from Ent Group. They were followed by Hong Kong crime thriller “Project Gutenberg,” with $8.17 million.

China’s week-long National Day holiday begins Monday. For many people, Saturday was treated as an additional working day. Once the holiday period gets underway for more people, box office numbers are likely to swell.

“Money” was produced by Mahua FunAge, a company that is China’s market leader in live comedy and that made a successful transition into film with 2015’s “Goodbye Mr. Loser,” which made $218 million, 2016’s “Mr. Donkey” and last year’s sports comedy “Never Say Die.” “Never Say Die” was released at this time last year and grossed $340 million.

Starring Jade, the female lead in Chinese blockbuster “Wolf Warriors II,” “Money” is a story involving mistaken identities, wedding plans and the surprise participation of a man’s wealthy aunt (Jade) at his engagement party.

“Shadow” is a big-budget, period action drama, directed by Zhang Yimou (“Hero,” “Curse of the Golden Flower”). It had prestige launches at the Venice and Toronto film festivals.

The delayed new releases meant that holdover titles enjoyed two extra days of release before losing their screens. Romantic drama “Cry Me a River” headed the chart Friday and Sunday and earned $6.14 million, for a 10-day cumulative gross of $31.9 million. Fifth place belonged to new release “Fat Buddies.”

Holdover actioner “Golden Job” earned $4.71 over the weekend, for a 10-day cumulative of $43.9 million. Previous chart-topper “L Storm” earned $2.38 million for seventh place and a 17-day cumulative of $63.3 million. “Mission: Impossible – Fallout” edged its cumulative to $181 million after 31 days.

THREADS (COPIED):
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Shadow by Zhang Yimou (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70319-Shadow-by-Zhang-Yimou)

[GeneChing]

China Box Office Drops 22 Percent During Holiday Week as Local Titles Underperform (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-drops-22-percent-holiday-week-as-local-titles-underperform-1150089)
1:14 AM PDT 10/8/2018 by Patrick Brzeski

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2018/09/14july_0180-h_2018.jpg
Courtesy Panasia Films Limited
'Project Gutenberg'

Bona Film Group's 'Project Gutenberg' came out on top during the weeklong National Day holiday, which is usually one of China's biggest box-office periods of the year.

Hong Kong action flick Project Gutenberg, starring Chow Yun-fat and Aaron Kwok, was the winner of a markedly downbeat National Day holiday season at the Chinese box office.

The weeklong holiday corridor, which commemorates the founding of the People's Republic of China and runs Oct. 1-Oct. 8, is typically one of the most lucrative moviegoing periods of the year. But total ticket sales during the frame were down 22.2 percent compared to the 2017 National Day stretch, data from box-office analysis company Artisan Gateway shows.

Last year's holiday served as the launchpad for local comedy blockbuster Never Say Die, which went on to earn more than $330 million. It's already clear that no National Day title will come close to hitting those heights this year, however.

Project Gutenberg, produced by Bona Film Group, Alibaba Pictures and others, pulled in $85.4 million during the frame, coming from behind to beat local comedy Hello, Mrs. Money, from Funage Pictures, which totaled just $55.5 million for the week.

Both Project Gutenberg and Hello, Mrs. Monday opened during the weekend prior to the holiday, which were replacement workdays in China. The films' total earnings stand at $92.9 million and $70.4 million, respectively.

No Hollywood titles were granted a release date during National Day, as is China's usual practice durning lucrative holiday seasons — a continual point of contention between Beijing and the Motion Picture Association of America.

Chow Yun-Fat stars in Project Gutenberg as a criminal mastermind, code-named "Painter," who leads a shadowy gang of currency counterfeiters. Outwitted at every turn, the Hong Kong police recruit a man (Aaron Kwok) from inside Painter's crew in order to unmask the elusive crook's true identity.

Zhang Yimou's critically acclaimed martial arts saga Shadow ranked third during the holiday break, earning $52.6 million for a cumulative gross of $62.1 million. Produced by Perfect Village and Le Vision Pictures, Shadow is widely tipped to be China's submission for the best foreign-language film category at the Oscars, but Beijing has yet to officially confirm its choice.

Maglim Pictures' Fat Buddies, a copy comedy about a pair of obese officers, brought in $22.6 million, lifting its total to $27.2 million. Enlight Pictures' holdover romantic drama Cry Me a Sad River added $12.4 million during the holiday frame for a $42.2 million total.

Alibaba Pictures may have scored a win with its participation in Project Gutenberg, but it also was responsible for National Day 2018's biggest flop: the visual effects-heavy video game adaptation Legend of the Ancient Sword. Directed by former Hollywood filmmaker turned Beijing transplant Renny Harlin (Die Hard 2, Jackie Chan's Skip Trace), the film earned just $1.8 million during its first seven days, spelling millions in losses for Jack Ma's film studio.

Despite the "light local title performance" during National Day, China's total box office for 2018 to date remains up 11.5 percent, Artisan Gateway said.


THREADS:
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
China's National Day & Golden Week (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70991-China-s-National-Day-amp-Golden-Week)

[GeneChing]

Chinese Film Industry Facing "Bloodbath," Producer Andre Morgan Says (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/chinese-film-industry-facing-bloodbath-says-producer-1154921)
10:48 PM PDT 10/24/2018 by Georg Szalai

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2018/10/gettyimages-495680728_1.jpg
Amanda Edwards/WireImage
Andre Morgan

"There will be a lot of money written off, because there were so many movies made that made no economic sense," says Andre Morgan.
The Chinese film industry is facing a "bloodbath" after a glut of "dumb money" led to too many movies being made, producer Andre Morgan (The Cannonball Run; Way of the Dragon; Walker, Texas Ranger) said at the Tokyo film festival’s TIFFCOM market on Thursday.

In what was dubbed a Master-Class Seminar by a pioneer of developing relationships between the U.S. and Chinese film industries, Morgan shared his take on the state of the business in the second-largest box-office market in the world. 


The founder of production company Ruddy Morgan Organization, the producer started his work with China when he assisted on the production of Bruce Lee’s Way of the Dragon (1972) and Enter the Dragon (1973). He has also worked with the likes of Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Andy Lau and director John Woo. For the past 13 years, he has been the co-chairman of the Chinese-American Film Festival.

"China has gone through phenomenal growth," including a couple of "phenomenal years" where local hits, such as Lost in Thailand, started breaking Chinese records, which meant that "the Chinese public started to discover there was quality product being made in China," Morgan said. "It wasn't to the exclusion of Hollywood, but it was parallel to what Hollywood was doing."

This gave "courage" to people in China to invest more money in homegrown product, he added. But "like everything in China — they kind of feast or famish — they kind of overshot the market," he argued. "And so now we have a situation where an awful lot of dumb money went into the industry and overinflated the price of the actors,” some of whom, such as Fan Bingbing, have been facing tax and financial investigations.


"The government has stepped in to clean [this] up," Morgan said. Stars and others have basically been given until Dec. 31 "to clean up their act," but "come January, it will be open season on those that haven’t paid their taxes." He said the same goes for production companies and others in the industry.

"I think, personally, next year will be a bloodbath," Morgan predicted. "There will be a lot of money written off, because there were so many movies made that made no economic sense." Too often producers tried to beat Hollywood at its game by making effects movies while ignoring the need for a good script or a story consumers actually want to see.


He also said: "China right now is suffering from a glut of money," meaning there will have to be a phase of "constriction," which will affect "the number of production companies" and the amount of money spent. 

That likely means "a painful coming 18 months," but after that there will be a "leaner, more vibrant" industry in China.


The expanding entertainment industry ties between Japan and China have been a key focus of this year’s TIFFCOM, which is wrapping on Thursday.

Morgan emphasized in his session that a co-production treaty signed by China and Japan this year will open up opportunities for Japanese entertainment industry professionals in China.

Not sure I agree with this. Chicoms know how to toe the line...or get sent to the gulag...or worse.

[GeneChing]

$3.99 per month? I might subscribe to this.



HOME DIGITAL ASIA OCTOBER 31, 2018 10:07AM PT
Cinedigm Sets Launch of ‘Bambu’ Chinese Entertainment Streaming Service (https://variety.com/2018/digital/news/cinedigm-bambu-chinese-entertainment-streaming-1203016012/)
By TODD SPANGLER
NY Digital Editor
@xpangler

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/10/cinedigm-bambu.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF CINEDIGM

Cinedigm is prepping a new internet-streaming service designed for American fans of Chinese entertainment.

The company plans to launch of Bambu in the first quarter of 2019, with a package of content aimed at Gen Z and millennial audiences in the U.S. Bambu will be available as both a free ad-supported VOD service and an ad-free subscription-based service for $3.99 per month.

Bambu will offer thousands of hours of Chinese film and TV shows, according to Cinedigm. The company, and independent content aggregator and distributor, will procure content for Bambu from licensor partners, including top Chinese licensors and distributors.

The upcoming launch of Bambu comes after Cinedigm last year sold a majority stake in the company to Bison Capital, a Hong Kong-based investment firm. It subsequently inked deals with Chinese entertainment companies including Starrise Media and Youku Pictures. Cindeigm also has a partnership with state-run broadcaster Central China Television.

Bambu “is another very important step in our bilateral content-distribution strategy for China and North America,” Bill Sondheim, president of Cinedigm Entertainment Group. In addition, he said, Bambu will provide audience feedback to Chinese producers working to produce movies and TV series for a global audience.

Cindeigm currently operates six other niche-oriented OTT streaming networks: mixed-martial arts channel CombatGO; CONtv, geared around pop-culture and fandom; documentary service Docurama; the faith-and-family Dove Channel, HallyPop, and esports channel Wham.

The move by Cinedigm to expand its specialty OTT services comes amid a pullback on the niche-SVOD front by AT&T’s WarnerMedia, which in the last two weeks pulled the plug on K-drama service DramaFever and FilmStruck, catering to fans of classic, arthouse and indie films.

Programming available on Bambu will include action epics, serial dramas, romantic comedies, sci-fi, horror, and fantasy adventure sagas, as well as music and reality series and educational programming like instructional Chinese-language courses and cultural cooking shows.

Film titles eyed for Bambu include bomb-squad thriller “Shock Wave,” starring Andy Lau; sci-fi epic “Kung Fu Traveler”; and “The Monkey King: Havoc In Heaven’s Palace,” starring Donnie Yen and Chow Yun-Fat. TV series slated for distribution on Bambu include “Journey to the West,” billed as the most-watched show in Chinese TV history; historical drama “Nirvana in Fire”; thriller “Lost in Translation”; food/cooking documentary series “A Bite of China”; fantasy crime show “The Four”; and new hits such as “The Advisors Alliance” and “Diamond Lover.”

“Young Americans are incredibly culturally savvy, and proudly receptive to the latest global trends,” Erick Opeka, Cinedigm’s president of digital networks, said in a statement. “Bambu allows these modern tastemakers to stay at the cultural forefront, introducing them to a roster of new series and up-and-coming artists that they can discover and show their friends.”

[GeneChing]

I've been trying to think of how best to present this because it's dense. I decided to present the full list here on the Chollywood rising thread (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising) and partial lists to start new indie threads for the titles that look martially interesting or are relevant to other threads.


AFM 2018: The buzz titles from Hong Kong and China (https://www.screendaily.com/features/afm-2018-the-buzz-titles-from-hong-kong-and-china/5134200.article)
BY LIZ SHACKLETON 2 NOVEMBER 2018

Despite dipping box office and a censorship process slowing up the production pipeline, there are some knockout titles to get excited about for Chinese New Year.

https://d1nslcd7m2225b.cloudfront.net/Pictures/780xany/1/4/0/1292140_airpocalypse_1_887940.jpg
SOURCE: WANDA PICTURES
‘AIRPOCALYPSE’

Mainland China’s film industry is going through a turbulent period. Despite the success of Bona Film Group’s Project Gutenberg, which grossed nearly $160m over the National Day holidays, box office was on a downward trend in October 2018 compared to the previous year. In addition, the censorship process has slowed following the Chinese authorities’ overhaul of their regulatory infrastructure and the government’s recent request that talent and production companies pay their back taxes has sent the industry into a spin.

As a result, production is expected to slow down in the last quarter of this year, which could result in a shortage of big titles in the second half of 2019, but there is still a large volume of films in production and post-production that are on offer at AFM. Big titles scheduled for release before the end of the year include Wanda Pictures’ fantasy drama Airpocalypse and Huayi Brothers’ action adventure Mojin: The Worm Valley.

Although it is still early days for scheduling, films jostling for release during the peak Chinese New Year holiday period in February 2019 include Mega-Vision Project Workshop’s Enter The Fat Dragon, starring Donnie Yen; Emperor Motion Pictures’ Integrity, directed by Alan Mak and starring Sean Lau and Nick Cheung; and Jackie Chan’s The Knight Of Shadows: Between Yin And Yang.

Airpocalypse - dir Xiao Yang
Xiao Yang is directing and heading the cast of this fantasy drama, about four gods who are relegated to living on Earth and create an environmental catastrophe in their attempts to get back into heaven. Jennifer Du and Xiao Shenyang also star in the film, which is scheduled for release on December 21. Xiao previously directed Old Boys: Way Of The Dragon and stars in both of the hit Detective Chinatown films.
Contact: Wen Mengchen, Wanda Pictures

Anita - dir Longman Leung
Currently in production, this long-awaited biopic of Anita Mui stars model Louise Wong, making her acting debut, as the hugely popular singer and actress who died in 2003 aged just 40. Produced by Edko Films and Irresistible Films, the drama also stars Terrance Lau and is due for release next year. Director Leung is co-director of hit action dramas Cold War and Cold War 2 with Sunny Luk.
Contact: Julian Chiu, Edko Films

Bodies At Rest - dir Renny Harlin
Nick Cheung, Richie Jen and Yang Zi head the cast of Renny Harlin’s Chinese-language action thriller, which is in post-production for release in April 2019. Scripted by David Lesser, the film follows a group of masked thugs who break into a morgue demanding access to a body that contains evidence of a crime they committed. Wanda Pictures and Media Asia co-produce, with the latter also handling international sales.
Contact: Fred Tsui, Media Asia

Chasing The Dragon II: Master Of Ransom - dirs Wong Jing, Jason Kwan
In post-production, the second instalment in Wong Jing’s Chasing The Dragon series is based on a real-life spate of kidnappings that terrorised Hong Kong’s elite in the 1990s. Tony Leung Ka-fai plays the kidnap king, while Louis Koo is the undercover agent who infiltrates his gang. Wong and Kwan also co-directed Chasing The Dragon, based on the true story of drug dealer Ng Sek-ho, which was a hit in Hong Kong and China last year.
Contact: Angela Wong, Mega-Vision Project Workshop

A City Called Macau - dir Li Shaohong
Fifth Generation filmmaker Li Shaohong (The Door, Stolen Life) directs this Macau-set romantic drama from a script by Yan Geling (Youth). Bai Baihe, Huang Jue and Wu Gang head the cast of the film about a woman working as a VIP client servicing manager at a casino, who falls for a charismatic gambler. Produced by Bona Film Group, the film is currently in post-production.
Contact: June Wu, Distribution Workshop

Enter The Fat Dragon - dir Kenji Tanigaki
Donnie Yen and Wong Jing both produce and star in this action title about an overweight cop with emotional issues who is tasked with escorting a convict to Japan. Scheduled for release over the Chinese New Year holidays in February 2019, the film is directed by renowned action choreographer Kenji Tanigaki, whose credits include The Monkey King and Japanese manga adaptation Rurouni Kenshin.
Contact: Angela Wong, Mega-Vision Project Workshop

Hotel Soul Good - dir Anthony Yan Pak-wing
Produced by Hong Kong’s Plus One Motion Pictures, this romantic comedy features an ensemble cast of Hong Kong talents including Chrissie Chau (29+1), Louis Cheung (Zombiology: Enjoy Yourself Tonight), Eric Kot (Fantasia), Maggie Shiu (PTU) and Richard Ng (Vampire Cleanup Department). Chau plays an executive in the hospitality industry who opens a new hotel when she loses her job and boyfriend after a meteor shower enables her to see dead people. The film was released in Hong Kong on October 18.
Contact: Tiffin Shing, Golden Dragon Pictures

Integrity - dir Alan Mak
Director Alan Mak and producers Felix Chong and Ronald Wong, who worked together on the Overheard trilogy, are reteaming on this crime thriller, which is in post-production for tentative release over Chinese New Year 2019. The story follows a leading anti-corruption agent who is forced to team up with his ex-wife to salvage an investigation in which both the defendant and the whistleblower have disappeared. Sean Lau, Nick Cheung and Karena Lam head the cast.
Contact: Raymond Liu, Emperor Motion Pictures

Invincible Dragon - dir Fruit Chan
Max Zhang (Ip Man 3) and mixed martial-arts expert Anderson Silva star in Fruit Chan’s $12m action film about an undercover agent who helps the police solve mysterious cases, but clashes with a Macau detective and a US army veteran with a secret link to his past. Scheduled for release in the first quarter of 2019, the film also features behind-the-scenes talent such as DoP Cheng Siu Keung (Election) and action director Stephen Tung Wei (Operation Mekong).
Contact: Kat Yeung, Mandarin Motion Pictures

Ip Man 4 - dir Wilson Yip
The fourth instalment in producer Raymond Wong’s blockbuster Ip Man franchise will again star Donnie Yen as the eponymous hero, along with Chan Kwok Kwan, Vanness Wu and Scott Adkins. In post-production, the $52m film follows the eponymous kung-fu master to the US where his student Bruce Lee has upset the local martial-arts community by opening a Wing Chun school. Yuen Wo Ping is again on board as action director.
Contact: Kat Yeung, Mandarin Motion Pictures

The Knight Of Shadows: Between Yin And Yang - dir Vash
Jackie Chan stars as a demon hunter defending humanity from an inhuman invasion in this period action comedy, which also stars Ethan Juan, Elane Zhong and Lin Peng. When a mysterious force starts kidnapping village girls to feast on their souls, Chan’s character encounters another demon hunter who is not fully human. In post-production for release during Chinese New Year 2019, the film is produced by Kiefer Liu (The Monkey King series) and backed by iQiyi Pictures, Beijing Sparkle Roll Media and Golden Shore Films & Television.
Contact: Tiffin Shing, Golden Network Asia

Airpocalypse (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71067-Airpocalypse)
Bodies At Rest (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71068-Bodies-At-Rest)
Chasing The Dragon II: Master Of Ransom (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71069-Chasing-The-Dragon-II-Master-Of-Ransom)
Enter the Fat Dragon redux with Donnie Yen (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70631-Enter-the-Fat-Dragon-redux-with-Donnie-Yen)
Invincible Dragon (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70166-Invincible-Dragon)
Ip Man 4 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69747-Ip-Man-4)
The Knight of Shadows Between Yin and Yang (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70545-The-Knight-of-Shadows-Between-Yin-and-Yang)

continued next post

[GeneChing]

Last Letter - dir Shunji Iwai
Japanese director Shunji Iwai’s first foray into Chinese-language cinema is produced by Peter Ho-sun Chan’s We Pictures and stars Zhou Xun, Qin Hao, Du Jiang and Wu Yanshu. Exploring similar themes to Iwai’s 1995 drama Love Letter, the film is a romantic drama revolving around two generations of characters and a series of letters that fall into the wrong hands. Chinese release is scheduled for November 9. Japan’s Toho is producing a Japanese-language version, also directed by Iwai, which is due to start production next summer.
Contact: Andree Sham, We Distribution

A Lifetime Treasure - dirs Mak Kai Kwong, Andrew Lam Man Chung
Produced by Teddy Robin, this comedy is set in an old people’s home where the peace of an eccentric group of retirees is about to be shattered by a gangster out for revenge. Co-director Lam plays the retired doctor who runs the home, while the cast also includes Robin, Ivana Wong (Golden Chickens), Sammo Hung (My Beloved Bodyguard), Lam Suet (Trivisa) and Louis Cheung (Keeper Of Darkness). The film is in production for release over Chinese New Year 2019.
Contact: Grace Chan, Entertaining Power Co

Limbo - dir Soi Cheang
Produced by Wilson Yip and Paco Wong, this $16m action drama stars Lam Ka Tung as a veteran detective and Mason Lee as a rookie cop, both on the trail of a serial killer. Cya Liu plays a woman who volunteers to work on the case as penance for killing the detective’s wife and child in an accident, although her embittered colleague can’t forgive her. The film is backed by Sun Entertainment Culture, Er Dong Pictures, Bona Film Group and Sil-Metropole Organization, and is in post-production.
Contact: Chiu Yi Leung, Bravos Pictures

Li Na - dir Peter Ho-sun Chan
Chan’s highly anticipated biopic of mainland Chinese tennis champion Li Na is currently shooting in Wuhan for a tentative late 2019 or early 2020 release. The film is produced by Jojo Hui Yuet-chun and scripted by Zhang Ji, who also wrote Chan’s Dearest and American Dreams In China. The identity of the actress playing Li — who has been in training for two years in order to realistically portray Asia’s first Grand Slam singles champion — is being kept under wraps.
Contact: Andree Sham, We Distribution

Lost, Found - dir Lu Yue
Yao Chen and Ma Yili star in this drama about a woman locked in a bitter custody battle with her ex-husband, whose daughter is kidnapped by the seemingly helpful nanny. A renowned cinematographer, Lu also has directing credits including Locarno Golden Leopard winner Mr Zhao (1998) and Thirteen Princess Trees (2006), which won a special jury prize at Tokyo International Film Festival. Lost, Found premiered at Shanghai International Film Festival and is currently on release in mainland China, where it has grossed more than $30m.
Contact: Celia Hao, Huayi Brothers

Mojin: The Worm Valley - dir Fei Xing
Enlight Media is producing two $40m action adventure films based on the popular Ghost Blows Out The Light series of online novels: Mojin: The Worm Valley, which is in post-production for release before the end of the year, and Mojin: The Dragon Ridge, scheduled for release in 2019. Both films are directed by Fei Xing (Silent Witness) and star newcomers Cai Heng, Yu Heng, Gu Xuan and Chen Yusi. Huayi Brothers is distributing in China and handling international sales.
Contact: Celia Hao, Huayi Brothers

Reborn - dir Li Hai Long
Han Geng, Rhydian Vaughan, Li Yuan and Japan’s Tomohisa Yama****a star in this thriller about a geeky programmer who is forced to become an undercover agent when he is dragged into a dangerous cyber game. Produced by Andre Morgan and Zoe Chen, the film has Nick Powell (Resident Evil: Retribution) on board as action director.
Contact: Chiu Yi Leung, Bravos Pictures

The Rookies - dir Alan Yuen
Produced by China’s New Classics Media and Hong Kong’s Emperor Motion Pictures, this action adventure from Firestorm director Alan Yuen filmed in China and Hungary with a cast including Wang Talu (Our Times), Sandrine Pinna (Legend Of The Demon Cat) and Milla Jovovich (Resident Evil series). The story follows an extreme sports enthusiast, a bumbling cop and her best friend who are dragged into the world of international espionage and tasked with preventing a terrorist mastermind from using weapons of mass destruction.
Contact: Raymond Liu, Emperor Motion Pictures

Shock Wave 2 (working title) - dir Herman Yau
Andy Lau and director Herman Yau are reteaming on a sequel to their hit action drama Shock Wave, which grossed $63m in mainland China last year. The sequel, which features completely new characters in a related story, revolves around a bomb disposal officer who is injured in a blast and then named as a suspect in a terrorist bombing. Currently in pre-production, the film is scheduled to start shooting early next year.
Contact: Mia Sin, Universe Films Distribution

Silence Of Smoke - dir Yojiro Takita
Best known as the director of Oscar-winning drama Departures, Japanese filmmaker Yojiro Takita is making his Chinese-language debut with this drama, co-produced by Media Asia and Magilm Pictures, which is currently shooting. Han Geng (So Young), Zhang Guoli (Back To 1942) and Summer Xu (Mr Six) head the cast of the film about a young cakemaker who takes over the family business but finds he can’t replicate his father’s success.
Contact: Fred Tsui, Media Asia

Unleashed - dirs Kwok Ka Hei, Ambrose Kwok
Produced by Paco Wong, this drama follows an underground boxer and his vendetta with a former champion, who has recently been released from prison and is attempting to destroy his mentor’s boxing studio. In pre-production, the film has Chris Collins on board as action director and is set to star Ken Low (Paradox), Sun Zhen Feng, Zheng Zi Ping, Venus Wong and Fire Lee.
Contact: Grace Chan, Entertaining Power Co

The Whistleblower - dir Xue Xiaolu
The director and star behind romantic comedy hit Finding Mr Right, Xue Xiaolu and Tang Wei, reunite for this China-Australia co-production, which is produced by Perfect Village Entertainment, Bill Kong’s Edko Films and Beijing Carving Films. Currently in post-production, The Whistleblower also stars Lei Jiayin (Guns And Roses) as a Chinese ex-pat in Australia who discovers a conspiracy at the company where he works.
Contact: Julian Chiu, Edko Films

The White Storm 2: Drug Lords (working title) - dir Herman Yau
Following their collaboration on Shock Wave, director Herman Yau and actor/producer Andy Lau are reteaming on a sequel to Benny Chan’s 2013 action drama The White Storm. In post-production, the $25m film also stars Louis Koo, who starred in the original, Michael Miu, Karena Lam and Cherrie Ying. The story again revolves around cops battling drug dealers in the Hong Kong underworld.
Contact: Mia Sin, Universe Films Distribution

A Lifetime Treasure (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71070-A-Lifetime-Treasure)
Mojin: The Worm Valley (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71071-Mojin-The-Worm-Valley)
Shock Wave (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70629-Shock-Wave-%E6%8B%86%E5%BC%B9%E4%B8%93%E5%AE%B6&p=1311447#post1311447)
Unleashed (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71072-Unleashed)

[GeneChing]

I've changed the title of my column in our print magazine. Henceforth, in the wake of our WINTER 2019 issue (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/magazine/article.php?article=1446), my movies/TV/media column is titled "Fast Forward to the Fight Scenes". As I explain in the issue, it's just a better fit as the term 'Chollywood' never really caught on enough to justify maintaining that title.

Nevertheless, this here thread persists, and here's some Chollywood-rising-related news:

JANUARY 3, 2019 4:28AM PT
Chinese Movie Ticketing Giant Maoyan Presses On With IPO
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/01/Maoyan-logo-large.jpg?crop=165px%2C95px%2C1258px%2C708px&resize=1000%2C563
CREDIT: COURTESY OF MAOYAN

Maoyan, one of China’s two largest movie ticket sales platforms, is warming up its plans for an IPO in Hong Kong. The company, which has the backing of Enlight, Tencent and Meituan Dianping, is believed to be aiming to raise about $300 million of fresh capital.

Under the name Entertainment Plus, the company published an updated version of its prospectus Thursday following the acceptance of its application by local stock market regulators. That will allow it to begin actively marketing the share issue. An earlier draft was posted in September.

The new draft does not specify the timetable or the number of shares to be issued. Local financial media reports have indicated that the share sale is considerably smaller than the $500 million-to-$1 billion scale indicated in September. At that point, the company indicated an overall valuation of $2.9 billion (HK$22.7 billion), and Hong Kong was leading the world in IPOs.

Since that time, share markets in Asia have plunged. Price-to-earnings multiples and corporate valuations have been battered by fears of the U.S.-China trade war, mainland China’s economic slowdown, and investor uncertainty about the tech sector.

China’s box office was reported this week as having grown by 9% in 2018, reaching $8.9 billion (RMB60.9 billion). Online sales, especially via mobile, account for more than 80% of cinema ticket transactions in China.

With that kind of usage, ticketing platforms are also increasingly important vehicles for film marketing and promotion. Maoyan plans to use its IPO proceeds roughly equally to fund infrastructure and development R&D, to enrich its content offerings and services and to make acquisitions, according to the prospectus. It has already indicated the purchase of a minority stake in Huanxi Media.

For the first nine months of 2018, Maoyan saw its revenues double to $446 million (RMB3.06 billion). Losses narrowed slightly in the January to end-September period to $21 million (RMB144 million).

The company has joint sponsors including Bank of America, Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley. China Renaissance is its financial advisor.

[GeneChing]

JANUARY 18, 2019 1:04AM PT
Alibaba Pictures Buys Into Chinese Director Han Han’s Film Studio (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/alibaba-pictures-shanghai-tingdong-han-han-green-book-1203111633/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/the-continent-w020140710276065000528.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
"The Continent," directed by Chinese racer and blogger Han Han
CREDIT: COURTESY OF DISTRIBUTION WORKSHOP

Alibaba Pictures confirmed that it has invested an undisclosed amount in Chinese celebrity blogger-turned-film director Han Han’s Shanghai Tingdong Film. Han’s upcoming “Pegasus” is one of the most anticipated films of the year in China.

Alibaba Pictures, part of e-commerce giant Alibaba, is now the second-largest stakeholder in Tingdong. It has a 13.1% stake, according to Chinese finance publication Caixin.

The deal is a “long-term strategic partnership that covers content production, distribution and marketing, merchandise and artist management,” Alibaba told Variety on Thursday. It falls under the umbrella of a new initiative launched in November called the “Jin Cheng Co-Production Plan” — with “jin cheng” roughly translating in English to “golden orange.”

Under this plan, Alibaba intends to co-produce 20 films over the next five years with various top production teams. The films will be released during China’s four busiest movie-going times: Chinese New Year (around January-February), the summer, the National Day holiday period in October and at the end of the year.

A race-car driver who rose to fame as a satirical blogger and published his first bestselling novel at 17, Han, now 37, was hailed in his younger days as the voice of the post-Tiananmen generation of Chinese youth. He shifted to movies in 2014 with “The Continent,” a road-trip comedy that marked his first turn as screenwriter and director.

He established Tingdong in 2015. The company has since produced five films that brought in about $355 million (RMB2.4 billion), Caixin said. The titles include “Duckweed,” a 2017 Chinese New Year hit written and directed by Han that grossed more than RMB1 billion ($148 million).

Its latest feature, “Pegasus,” is scheduled for release Feb. 5, the first day of Chinese New Year celebrations, and already seems poised to beat out most of the competition. More than 280,000 people have indicated on ticketing platform Maoyan that they want to see the film, making it the most second-most hotly anticipated title out of the whopping 13 films lined up for release that same day.

This is the third round of financing obtained by Tingdong since Han deployed a modest RMB15.2 million ($2.2 million) of startup capital. In February 2016, the company received tens of millions of yuan from Puhua Capital. And in October 2017, it received a $45.8 million (RMB310 million) joint investment from Bona Film, Chenhai Capital, and a Shanghai-based cultural center, the Beijing News cited the Tianyan business database as showing. The joint investment represented a 15.5% stake at the time, the Beijing News said, indicating that the company’s valuation had already reached $295 million by then (RMB2 billion).

Information from Tianyan shows that on Jan. 9, Tingdong brought in Li Jie, senior VP of Alibaba Pictures and head of Alibaba’s ticketing platform Tao Piaopiao, as a company director. Han Han currently has 14 companies other than Tingdong registered in his name, ranging from film and TV outfits to cultural communications and tech, Tianyan shows.


The first film to be released under Alibaba’s “Jin Cheng” plan is “Peppa Pig Celebrates Chinese New Year,” a co-production with Entertainment One that will hit theaters on Feb. 5 as well. Next in the plan’s lineup will be a 2020 fantasy suspense movie whose Chinese title translates to “The Assassination of a Novelist.” A co-production with Huace Media and Beijing Free Whale Pictures, it will be directed by Lu Yang, best known for the 2014 martial arts movie “Brotherhood of Blades” and its 2017 sequel.

Alibaba’s investment in Tingdong comes at the start of what will be a difficult year for the local Chinese film industry, which faces massive production slowdowns and uncertainties because of new tax regulations and cautious investors. But losses for the Chinese industry’s smaller players may create opportunity for Hollywood, and for China’s best-capitalized players.

Last week, an Alibaba producer announced that Golden Globe-winning “Green Book” would get a China release sometime this year but did not reveal an exact date, Chinese state media reported. Alibaba describes itself as an investor in the film, though its name was not on the credits when the film premiered in September at the Toronto festival.

“It is such an amazing picture, which includes humorous dialogues, excellent acting performance, and touching friendship,” Alibaba Pictures president Zhang Wei said, according to the Chinese state broadcaster’s English-language channel CGTN. “We are so honored to participate in the course of co-production, as well as to introduce it to the Chinese audience.”

More on Peppa Pig (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71112-Year-of-the-Pig-2019&p=1312089#post1312089) & Brotherhood of Blades (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70222-Brotherhood-of-Blades-2).

THREADS
Jack Ma & Alibaba (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69642-Jack-Ma-amp-Alibaba)
Chollywood Rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

Odd prediction to make just prior to the CNY (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71112-Year-of-the-Pig-2019) movie rush...feels premature.


JANUARY 21, 2019 2:13AM PT
Chinese Entertainment Industry Braces for a ‘Cold Winter’ in 2019 (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/tencent-entertainment-angelababy-bona-1203113285/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/05/red-sea-explosion-2-res-e1522763460315.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF EMPEROR MOTION PICTURES

Winter is here for the Chinese entertainment industry, a half-dozen top-tier industry professionals concurred in Beijing at the launch last week of Tencent Entertainment’s annual data-filled white paper.

China’s box office hit new heights in 2018, raking in about $9 billion, but it was also a year of drastic regulatory changes and a government tax crackdown that have spooked investors and put projects across the country on hold.

“Why call this period a ‘cold winter’? In 2018, 20 film and TV companies saw RMB160 billion of stock market value evaporate, while eight saw their valuation fall by more than 50%. The departure of capital has also made the entire film industry encounter unprecedented difficulties,” said Bona Film Group CEO Yu Dong, who was present to receive an award for “trending movie figure of the year.” Bona-backed “Operation Red Sea” was the top film at the Chinese box office last year, grossing more than $530 million (RMB3.65 billion).

Zhang Liyi, chief editor of online news portal Tencent Entertainment, joked about how people had felt the impact of the slowdown personally. “Before, everyone would always ask each other at get-togethers, ‘Have you eaten? Where are you going on holiday?’ Then in 2018, the most common greetings became ‘Is your project still alive?’ ‘Did your business partner run away?’ ‘Did you finish paying your taxes?’”

The film industry was shaken last summer when superstar Fan Bingbing temporarily disappeared from the public eye and was docked nearly $70 million in fines for tax evasion. The episode sparked a governmental push to tighten tax regulations, with many production companies now slammed with requests for back taxes.

The year to come will be about finding ways to cope with a new normal, many at last Wednesday’s Tencent event said.

“Everyone in the industry has already felt it: The stage of intensive production and expansive development is actually already over,” said Yang Ruichun, deputy editor-in-chief of Tencent’s online news portal qq.com. “After the shakeup of 2018, the entertainment industry will definitely enter a new middle period of development.”

Yang said that people would need to “actively reflect and embrace change” to stay afloat in 2019: “We’re in the midst of a cold winter, and if all you do when facing it is complain, I think you may freeze to death.”

Even social media darling Angelababy, known as much for having had a plastic surgeon examine the authenticity of her preternaturally pointed face as for her acting, seemed ruminative. “I think this winter will be a remedy to rid us of our impatience and giddiness. I hope that thanks to this winter, we can really reflect on what it is exactly that we want and truly wish to accomplish.” She was present to receive an award for “star of the year.”

Tencent’s fifth annual white paper noted a number of entertainment trends in China. This year, word-of-mouth became a key determinant of box office performance. In part, that may be because more users have developed the habit of leaving online reviews. The number of people willing to write a review after seeing a movie was up 86% in 2018 from the year before, with nearly three-quarters of viewers doing so more than a day later, Tencent data showed.

“Dying to Survive” star Xu Zheng, “Detective Chinatown 2’s” Wang Baoqiang, and actor turned writer-director Huang Bo were last year’s most bankable male stars, according to a popularity index developed by Tencent. Among actresses, comediennes Bai Baihe (“Monster Hunt 2”), Zhou Dongyu and veteran Zhang Ziyi led the pack.

Even though authorities approved fewer TV shows for production in 2018 than in past years, a greater percentage of them ended up actually on air — a likely sign of both more intensive content restrictions and of the industry’s increasing maturity. In 2017, only about 29% of shows approved by authorities ultimately ended up being broadcast either online or on television. In 2018, that figure grew to 36%.

Despite the industry-wide chill, the report’s data showed that variety shows developed by online streaming platforms were a notable sector of growth, particularly “X Factor”-style reality shows minting new pop culture idols. A number of stars from the top three programs — Tencent’s “The Coming One” and “Produce 101,” and iQiyi’s “Idol Producer” — are now household names.

While the number of variety shows on traditional satellite TV channels has fallen 15.5% in the past two years to 93, the number of online streaming ones have boomed, with nearly 40% more shows in 2018 than in 2016. Online programs with more than 1 billion viewers rose from two in 2016 to 21 last year, where for the first time, two programs also broke the 5-billion-viewer threshold.

Debashish Ghosh, managing director, international, at PMC, Variety‘s parent company, attended the event as a presenter.

[GeneChing]

JANUARY 23, 2019 10:02PM PT
Alibaba Lends $100 Million to Huayi Bros. in Film Investment Expansion (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/alibaba-huayi-film-investment-100-million-loan-1203116461/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/09/youth-tiff.jpg?w=1000&h=562&crop=1
CREDIT: TIFF

Alibaba Pictures Group, the film business arm of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, has struck a strategic cooperation deal with leading film studio Huayi Bros. The deal includes a $103 million (RMB700 million) loan to Huayi.

Alibaba Pictures said the agreement was part of its recently announced strategy to be involved in major movies aimed for release during China’s four yearly holiday periods: Chinese New Year (around January-February), the summer, National Day celebrations in October, and end of the year. The strategy, dubbed the Jin Cheng Co-Production Project, runs for five years. (“Jin Cheng” translates roughly into English as “Golden Orange.”)

The deal further expands the power and influence of deep-pocketed Internet platforms, such as Alibaba and Tencent, over the Chinese film industry. Alibaba and companies owned by founder Jack Ma have been significant minority shareholders in Huayi since 2014, and increased their positions again in 2015.

The new deal with Huayi runs for five years and commits the studio to delivering 10 films in which Asian Union, a subsidiary of Alibaba Pictures, can be a co-investor and co-distributor. The two companies also agreed to work together on talent development, film marketing and merchandising through Alibaba’s Tao Piaopiao and Beacon platforms.

The five-year loan, provided at China’s five-year base rate, will be used by Huayi as working capital and for company operations. As security for the loan, Huayi is providing share pledges, rights to returns from a film fund, and “unlimited joint and several guarantees provided by two major shareholders.” That appears to be a reference to Huayi founders and principals Dennis and James Wang.

Last week, Alibaba cited its Jin Cheng film investment plan as the reason behind its move to take a 13% stake in the Tingdong Film company controlled by celebrity race car driver-turned-blogger and filmmaker Han Han (“The Continent,” “Duckweed”). His new movie, “Pegasus,” is one of the most anticipated of the upcoming Chinese New Year season. Alibaba also recently invested in “Green Book” and “A Dog’s Journey,” the sequel to hit “A Dog’s Purpose.”

Huayi, in business as a private sector leader for over 20 years, has been behind hit films including the “Detective Dee” fantasy-action franchise and a string of movies by Feng Xiaogang (“Youth,” “I Am Not Madame Bovary”). It was also the Chinese partner of Hollywood independent STX Entertainment until the deal ran out at the end of December.

On Thursday morning, Huayi Bros shares climbed 6.6% to RMB4.85 on the news of the deal with Alibaba Pictures, whose own shares were little changed at HK$1.29 apiece.

THREADS
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Jack Ma & Alibaba (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69642-Jack-Ma-amp-Alibaba)

[GeneChing]

Anyone see Once Upon a Deadpool? I'm very curious about that.


FEBRUARY 03, 2019 1:18pm PT by Pamela McClintock
Box Office Surprise: 'Deadpool 2' Overtakes First Pic With $784M Globally (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/deadpool-2-box-office-overtakes-1st-deadpool-786m-1182193)

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/scale_crop_768_433/2018/05/deadpool2-mb0340_pubstill_v0212.1010_rgb-h_2018.jpg
Courtesy Twentieth Century Fox
'Deadpool 2'

The unexpected feat comes after the PG-13 cut of the film was allowed to play in China.
In another happy ending for the Merc with a Mouth, Deadpool 2 — including its family-friendly version — has crossed $784 million at the worldwide box office to become the highest-grossing title in 20th Century Fox's stable of X-Men movies.

The previous champ in the X-Men universe was the first Deadpool (2016), which collected $783 million in global ticket sales to become the top-grossing R-rated pic of all time, not adjusted for inflation.

Deadpool 2, produced by and starring Ryan Reynolds in the titular role, first hit theaters in May 2018.

In early December, Reynolds and 20th Century Fox unleashed a family-friendly version of the sequel, Once Upon a Deadpool, which is rated PG-13 instead of R. The move, although it was unorthodox, paid off.

Grosses for Once Upon a Deadpool have been added to Deadpool 2's running total, in keeping with the traditional practice for rereleases. Before the rerelease, Deadpool 2's global earnings stood at roughly $738 million.

The rerelease has generated north of $45 million in ticket sales. The vast majority of that has come from China, where Deadpool 2 took in north of $40 million in its first 10 days. The first Deadpool was never allowed to play in China; the sequel was allowed in because of the family-friendly version.

Last month, Reynolds traveled to China to promote the film's Jan. 25 debut.

THREAD
Deadpool 2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69436-Deadpool-2)
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

...China! ;)


FEBRUARY 25, 2019 9:08PM PT
U.S. Drama ‘Green Book’ Touted as Oscar Win for China (https://variety.com/2019/film/asia/green-book-china-oscar-win-1203149609/)
By PATRICK FRATER and BECKY DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/8u02_d003_00167r.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: PATTI PERRET

Chinese companies have been quick to claim their share of Oscar glory since Sunday’s ceremony, despite an awards season that largely shut out films from or about Asia, including “Crazy Rich Asians” and “Shoplifters.”

Alibaba Pictures, the heavily loss-making film financing and production arm of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, is busily talking up its involvement in best picture winner “Green Book.” The production company boarded the movie as an investor alongside Participant Media, Dreamworks Pictures and Amblin Partners (of which Alibaba is a minority owner) last summer. The film was nominated for five Oscars and won three Sunday, including best original screenplay and best actor in a supporting role. It will hit Chinese theaters on Friday.

“Even though Alibaba Pictures is a relatively new entrant into Hollywood, we have a track record of choosing quality projects that not only have high entertainment value, but also have positive messages we believe in,” said Zhang Wei, president of Alibaba Pictures. The company also made investments in two other awards contenders, “Capernaum” and “On the Basis of Sex.”

Another Chinese player, Perfect World Entertainment, which has interests stretching from games to movies, claimed its share of reflected glory with “BlacKkKlansman” (six nominations, including one win in the adapted screenplay category) and “First Man” (four nominations, including one win for best visual effects). Both were co-funded by Perfect World through its five-year finance deal with Universal Pictures.

China’s propaganda apparatus has gone a step further, including several Oscar winners that have Chinese involvement of some kind as examples of Chinese excellence. On Monday, China’s state-owned news agency Xinhua pronounced Pixar-produced “Bao” a Chinese-centric Oscars triumph.

“The short is written and directed by Chinese-born Canadian director Domee Shi,” who, Xinhua helpfully explained, “is the first woman and first Chinese writer and director of a Pixar short.” The news agency noted that “Bao” beat “One Small Step,” a “Chinese-American short film, directed by Zhang Shaofu…[which] tells the story of a young Chinese-American protagonist who dreams of being an astronaut.” In the documentary category, Xinhua claimed Chinese success through winner “Free Solo,” directed by Jimmy Chin and Elisabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, and through nominee “Minding the Gap,” directed by Chinese-American Liu Bing.

While there is much celebration on Chinese social media that “Bao” – a touching, realistic story about Chinese food and family – won such a high-profile accolade, several nationalistic state media reports champion a narrative that the wins, despite originating in other countries, are wins for China itself. The reports play up an old but recently much more prominent idea that people with Chinese heritage all over the world are connected to China by their ethnic identity. “Each of them is connected to China in its own way,” said Xinhua.

“It is a remarkable success given [U.S. President] Trump’s relentless China bashing,” said another commentator.

Beyond the rhetoric, however, there is increasing industrial synchronization between Hollywood and China. “The 91st Academy Awards can be viewed as the starting point for a new period of growing influence for China in the international film industry,” said Xinhua. The assertion is only inaccurate in that the movement quietly started several years ago.

The current dynamics are subtly different from those made in the 2012-2016 period, when Chinese companies were making aggressive and highly visible moves at the corporate level, like Alibaba and Wanda’s serious discussions about buying a piece of Sony Pictures Entertainment. Wanda bought Legendary Entertainment and unsuccessfully bid $1 billion for Dick Clark Productions. Video platform Le Vision/Le Eco made lavish slate announcements in Hollywood as recently as 2016, before gravity and Chinese regulators dragged them back to reality.

However, what has replaced that five-year surge of Chinese mad money has been a quieter drive to invest, learn, and integrate China into Hollywood. The initiative has been conducted by a smaller number of companies – Alibaba Pictures, Tencent, and Perfect World – which each have long-term game plans and have quietly opened offices in L.A.

Perfect World’s deal with Universal is largely a passive investment, but the company is simultaneously behaving like a Hollywood indie and developing its own material and scripts. (In China, Perfect World is further partnered with Hollywood names Village Roadshow and WME in Perfect Village Entertainment, a local production venture.)

“Both luck and persistence are very important. Alibaba Pictures will do everything in its power to support every young director to go global and vie for the Oscars,” said chairman and CEO of Alibaba Pictures Fan Luyan.

THREADS
The Academy Awards (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?20798-The-Academy-Awards)
Bao (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69387-Dim-Sum-dian-xin&p=1308311#post1308311)
Alibaba (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69642-Jack-Ma-amp-Alibaba)
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

I suspect it would be sooner if they'd lose the patriotic attachment...or at least be a little more subtle about it.


MARCH 3, 2019 4:38AM PT
China Aims to Become ‘Strong Film Power’ Like U.S. by 2035, Calls for More Patriotic Films (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/china-strong-film-power-by-2035-wants-more-patriotic-films-1203153901/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/02/operation-red-sea.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: T.NOR

The Chinese government has exhorted filmmakers to turn the country into a “strong film power” like the U.S. by 2035 and called for the production of 100 movies a year that each earn more than RMB100 million ($15 million) as part of a push to increase China’s soft power.

The targets were set by Wang Xiaohui, executive deputy director of the Central Propaganda Department and director of the National Film Bureau, at the first nationwide industry symposium since the former agency took jurisdiction over the latter. Government officials, film scholars, representatives of major film companies and industry associations gathered in Beijing on Wednesday for a symposium that set the tone for the future development of China’s industry with the propaganda bureau in the driver’s seat.

The names of luminaries such as directors Chen Kaige, Zhang Yimou, Ning Hao, Guan Hu, and Huang Jianxin, as well as actors Zhang Ziyi, Wu Jing, and Chen Daoming, were on the list of attendees, according to the People’s Daily newspaper, the mouthpiece of the ruling Communist Party.

Wang was named head of China’s film bureau last May, following a major government restructuring. He said that a major concern is that “the international influence of Chinese film still has such a long way to go.” Last year, American films took in about $2.8 billion in the China market, but Chinese films in the U.S. market made only a few tens of millions. With its massive local box office, China had already become a “big film power,” but it needed to shift to becoming a “strong film power” like the U.S. by 2035, he said.

“China has already taken its place at the center of the world stage, and Chinese films must have their proper place in the world,” Wang said, according to the People’s Daily. “But the Chinese film industry’s current level of development is not commensurate with China’s national status. A country’s level of film development reflects its total national strength.”

He said that the biggest problem facing the Chinese film industry was one of quality. “Overall, our ability to tell stories lags far behind Hollywood and Bollywood’s,” Wang said.

The 100 films a year that gross more than $15 million each should be “about realistic topics” and must “equally generate social impact and financial profits,” he said. They should take “the Chinese dream of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation” as their theme and have “patriotic plots.”

Filmmakers “must have a clear ideological bottom line and cannot challenge the political system.” Cultivating new film artists was “extremely urgent and important,” as a lack of talent has so far been a big setback, he added.

In a summary of last year’s industry performance, Wang called for the country to consolidate production capacity on profitable projects. In 2018, homegrown Chinese films accounted for a record 62.15% of the total local box office. But the money brought in was disproportionately earned by the top 10 grossing films, with just 2% of Chinese theatrical releases bringing in 53% of the box office. Meanwhile, 300 out of the 400 movies shown last year brought in less than 1 million RMB, while hundreds more never even made it to cinemas, indicating wasted resources.

Thanks to scandals involving high-profile actors that resulted in film-release cancellations, Wang also announced that China would establish a “national film industry ethics committee.” Most recently, the Chinese New Year romcom “A Boyfriend for My Girlfriend” was pulled because of a scandal involving the lead actor and his mistress, while earlier in the year, a tax-evasion case involving actress Fan Bingbing caused her forthcoming works to disappear. China set up a similar ethics committee for the gaming industry last year.

[GeneChing]

China’s box office takes world-record US$1.66 billion in February as Lunar New Year hits like The Wandering Earth pack cinemas (https://www.scmp.com/business/china-business/article/2188591/chinas-box-office-takes-world-record-us166-billion-february)
Chinese theatres generated 11.1 billion yuan in ticket sales, with space-exploration film The Wandering Earth proving the biggest draw
Pearl Liu
Updated: Tuesday, 5 Mar, 2019 6:03am

https://cdn1.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/styles/1200x800/public/images/methode/2019/03/04/914e6b4a-3e7d-11e9-b20a-0cdc8de4a6f4_image_hires_214127.JPG?itok=McPsRxuz
A scene from Chinese sci-fi movie The Wandering Earth. Photo: China Film Group Corporation

China’s box office receipts soared to a world-record 11.1 billion yuan (US$1.66 billion) in February as film fans flocked to cinemas to catch The Wandering Earth and other blockbusters during the Lunar New Year holiday.
The sales figure, provided by Maoyan Entertainment, China’s biggest movie ticketing app, is the highest ever recorded in a single month anywhere, and beats the previous record of 10.1 billion yuan set by China in the same month a year earlier.
It was well over three times the total revenue of North American theatres in February, which was US$478.5 million (3.2 billion yuan) according to Box Office Mojo.
The ticket revenue was generated by 12 films during the month, with by far the biggest boost coming from the holiday period from February 4 to 10. Traditionally a time for friends and family to come together, the Lunar New Year has become something of a golden period for film releases in China.
The total box office during the festivities, contributed by eight movies, reached 5.8 billion yuan, inching up slightly from 5.74 billion yuan in 2018, according to data from Maoyan.
By far the biggest draw was the Chinese space-exploration film, The Wandering Earth, a surprise box-office hit, which has raked in 4.45 billion yuan since its Lunar New Year debut.
“The success of the film signals that Chinese audiences have become more discerning, which has elevated the Chinese movie market to a more diversified and mature stage,” said Wu Chaoze, an analyst with China Securities who expects to see healthy growth of the market.
The movie, adapted from a novella by Hugo award-winning sci-fi author Liu Cixin and produced by China Film Group Corporation, became China’s second highest-grossing film after the 2017 action movie Wolf Warrior 2, which earned 5.68 billion yuan.
IMAX to show more Chinese-language films after sci-fi blockbuster The Wandering Earth sets box office record
Starring popular comedian Huang Bo and Glee actor Matthew Morrison, Crazy Alien ranked the second most popular film in February, taking 2.18 billion yuan. That was followed by Pegasus, directed and written by the famous
China is already the second largest movie market in the world after the US, with box office proceeds reaching 60.98 billion yuan in 2018, up 9 per cent from the previous year.
China’s box office takings in January came to 3.37 billion yuan. By comparison, North American cinemas took US$385.6 million in January (2.6 billion yuan), according to Box Office Mojo.

THREADS
Wandering Earth (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71046-The-Wandering-Earth)
Spring Festival (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71112-Year-of-the-Pig-2019)
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

JUNE 12, 2019 1:58PM PT
China’s Bona Film Group Lines Up Big Movies Through 2020 (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/chinas-bona-film-group-lines-up-big-movies-through-2020-1203241216/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/chasing-the-dragon-ii.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: WELL GO USA

Distributors and producers frequently bemoan the difficulty of understanding fast-moving audience trends in China. Affecting the outcome is the scale of country (some films skew toward northern or southern audiences, other titles play better in provincial towns than in the mega-cities and suburbs) and all are affected by word of mouth driven by ubiquitous social media.

For the tech giants encroaching on the film sector, such as Tencent, the response to such uncertainty is to draw on big data for insight and help in making production, distribution and marketing decisions. For more traditional distributors, such as Bona Film Group, the problem is how to strike a balance between having a slate wide enough that it stretches across different genres, and one that has enough tentpoles for the Chinese calendar’s four or five main holiday periods.

Box office in January this year dragged along at levels below 2018’s take. But the Chinese New Year holiday in February was highly competitive and produced the biggest B.O. numbers on record. Bona scored strongly with “Pegasus,” which scored over $255 million.

Predicting what happens in the rest of 2019 gets harder still. That’s because Chinese film production volumes were dealt a sharp blow in the second half of last year by a new industry regulatory regime and the crackdown on individual tax liabilities and the scramble to re-write contracts between talent and production companies.

This year, too, politics and sensitive anniversaries have a large impact on the releasing calendar. This year marks the centenary of the May 4, 1919, anti-imperialist student protests, as well as 70 years since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949.

To celebrate these (and to drown out a trio of anniversaries that are less comfortable for the Communist government), film companies have been urged to deliver a string of movies with patriotic and nationalist themes.

Bona’s slate is studded with these, most notably propaganda movie “AKA: Chairman Mao 1949,” directed by war film specialist Ning Haiqiang, to be released mid-September shortly ahead of the week-long National Day holidays.

Some efforts to bring government-backed propaganda titles into the modern age have seen budgets, production values and star-quotients all increased. But the trick has worn thin and 2017’s “The Founding of an Army,” which was backed by Bona and directed by Hong Kong star helmer/actor Andrew Lau, was a $61 million box office disappointment. It was crushed by the massive hit “Wolf Warriors II,” released the same day.

Bona learned the lesson that patriotic movies that are well-made and hail from the private sector can be genuinely popular. It’s “Operation Mekong” in 2016 and last year’s “Operation Red Sea” — both directed by Dante Lam — earned $172 million and $575 million, respectively. Bona has a multi-film deal with Lam, whose next action-heavy title, “The Rescue,” set within the China Coast Guards, has already staked out a prime February 2020 release slot.

Other films with nationalist stirrings on Bona’s slate include fact-based pair “The Bravest,” about firefighters tackling a blaze that might have scorched North Korea, and Lau’s “The Chinese Pilot,” based on a real 2018 aviation incident that was high on drama and heroism, and low on casualties.

Bona’s slate is peppered with Hollywood titles that are slotted into release dates in between the Chinese holidays and blackout periods. These are either sourced from the company’s multi-title co-financing and distribution arrangement with Sony Pictures Entertainment (“Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood”), from China-U.S. co-ventures (Fosun’s Ang Lee-directed “Gemini Man”) or are the largest films on the indie market, often secured with significant investment from Bona (AGC’s Roland Emmerich-directed “Midway” and New Regency’s James Gray-directed “Ad Astra”).

The line-up is rounded off with more traditional vehicles for local stars. Lau produces and stars in “Find Your Voice,” a classical music drama. “Ip Man 4: The Finale” rounds off the Wilson Yip-directed franchise, and pits Donnie Yen against British action star Scott Adkins, just in time for the Christmas peak season.

Below is Bona’s release schedule through the February holiday season.

June

“Chasing the Dragon II” (pictured)

Director: Wong Jing

Stars: Tong Leung Ka-fai, Louis Koo

“A City Called Macau”

Director: Li Shaohong

Star: Bai Baihe

July

“The Invincible Dragon”

Director: Fruit Chan

Stars: Zhang Jin, Juju Chan

“Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood”

Director: Quentin Tarantino

Stars: Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio

August

“The Bravest”

Director: Tony Chan

Star: Huang Xiaoming

“The Longest Shot”

Director: Xu Shunli

Stars: Yu Nan, Wang Zhiwen

September

“AKA: Chairman Mao 1949”

Director: Ning Haiqiang

“The Chinese Pilot”

Director: Andrew Lau

Star: Tang Guoqiang


October

“Gemini Man”

Director: Ang Lee

Star: Will Smith

“Midway”

Director: Roland Emmerich

Stars: Luke Evans, Woody Harrelson

December

“Find Your Voice”

Director: Adrian Kwan

Star: Andrew Lau

“Ip Man 4: The Finale”

Director: Wilson Yip

Stars: Donnie Yen, Scott Adkins

January-February 2020

“The Fat Dragon”

Director: Wong Jing

Stars: Donnie Yen, Jessica Jann

“The Rescue”

Director: Dante Lam

Star: Eddie Peng

Undated

“Ad Astra”

Director: James Gray

Stars: Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones

I'm just going to add the links to threads that we already have here below:
Chasing The Dragon II: Wild Wild Bunch (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71069-Chasing-The-Dragon-II-Wild-Wild-Bunch)
Invincible Dragon (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70166-Invincible-Dragon)
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70864-Once-Upon-a-Time-in-Hollywood)
Gemini Man (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71285-Gemini-Man)
Ip Man 4 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69747-Ip-Man-4)
Fat Dragon (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70631-Enter-the-Fat-Dragon-redux-with-Donnie-Yen)

[GeneChing]

JUNE 16, 2019 3:36PM PT
Chinese Script Development Requires A Different Touch, Top Producers Say (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/china-scripts-dangal-siddharth-roy-kapur-shanghai-international-film-festival-1203244836/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/meg-fp-0025.jpg?w=1000&h=562&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF WARNER BROS. PICTURES

Leading film producers highlighted the challenges of developing good scripts in China and abroad at a panel during the Shanghai International Film Festival on Sunday.

Wanda Media GM Jiang Wei (aka Wayne Jiang) recommended that producers remain aware of the real differences between the scriptwriting process for Chinese productions versus international and co-productions.

The fundamental distinction is that in China, “the screenwriting system is a service centered on the director, who is the creative center,” rather than the producer, he assessed. In his experience, he’d seen that this could be frustrating for Chinese writers, who, eager to finally put their own spin on things, would often fail to execute what he’d asked of them, and turn in scripts that veered too far away from the company or the director’s original vision, making it necessary to switch from writer to writer until someone stuck.

But when working on Hollywood films like “The Meg,” he saw that writers were used to doing multiple iterations of the same story without touching its overall direction or main storyline, and were used to discussing what elements they’d like to add before going ahead with them.

“I think this experience of mine is something to note for great producers… coming to China,” he said. “The type of screenwriter system you’re jumping into is an important factor in your choice of what kind of project to undertake.

Siddharth Roy Kapur, Indian producer of smash hit “Dangal,” provided advice on how producers should balance different players’ creative visions. “It’s important to bring the director on board as early in the process as possible,” he said. “If you bring the director on at the end of the process, the director wants to come in, but the writers want to make it their own.”

He added: “It is important as the producer to pick your battles – very often, there are producers that have writing aspirations, and they want to jump on writing the script. That leads to a larger conflict later.”

“You need to realize you’re not the writer. If you have a vision you’ve got to let the writers see it so that they can then go out and create magic. It can’t be a writing by committee — that never works.”

Huayi Brothers Pictures CEO Jerry Ye also highlighted the differences between China and the West when it comes to screenwriting.

“The thing with China right now is that there’s a huge lack of creative power… so we spend a huge amount of time finding a good script. I now require all my producers to spend 60% of their energy on the script,” he said. “This is something that’s hard to understand for foreign filmmakers because in many countries, there are loads of great scripts and stories sitting around, but no capital or market to support them. It’s the opposite in China.”

Most younger Chinese creatives still don’t understand the logic needed to create a successful script, Ye said, urging them to study foreign films and screenwriting techniques. Huayi therefore often had to resort to hiring foreign writers to “build the bones of a screenplay” before bringing in Chinese screenwriters to then “fill it out with flesh and blood,” Ye said. He laughed: “We could also just do more remakes — as long as they can pass censorship.”

THREADS
Shanghai International Film Festival (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71333-Shanghai-International-Film-Festival)
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

The Hollywood box office is down too. Maybe filmmakers need to lower their projected expectations. :rolleyes:


JULY 3, 2019 8:07PM PT
China Box Office Drops in First Six Months, Revealing Mounting Problems (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/china-box-office-the-wandering-earth-bona-1203258863/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/the-wandering-earth-chinese-sci-fi-movie.jpg?w=1000&h=562&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF CHINA FILM GROUP

China’s total box office fell 2.8% to $4.53 billion (RMB31.1 billion) in the first half of 2019. That was the the first such decline since 2011, Chinese media said.

Reports noted the dip with alarm and dismay. “Although the decline is not large, the situation does not look promising,” wrote Chinese industry website Mtime, while online news source The Paper wrote: “This year audiences could clearly feel that after Chinese New Year, there were no good films to watch, especially among domestic (Chinese) films.”

The slight fall in ticket sales also masks what The Paper called an even graver “hidden crisis”: a steep decrease in actual cinema-going. China’s total number of screenings has gone up, rising 7.98 million to 61.5 million in the first half of year, but at the same time, there has been a more than 10% drop in actual trips to the theater. Only 806 million tickets were sold in the past six months, down from 901 million in the first half of 2018.

This significant change has been offset by a rise in average ticket prices. Alibaba’s Lighthouse data app shows that average prices in the first half of the year rose some RMB3.04 ($0.44) apiece to RMB38.6 ($5.61)— a figure that might appear as even higher for consumers who are hit with rising online booking fees and falling e-commerce subsidies.

Despite this slowdown, movie theater construction has continued unabated. China has built 3,492 new screens so far in 2019, bringing the national total up to 64,944. Nevertheless, the rate of new screens appearing this year decreased by 15% compared with the same period last year. More than 9,000 were added in 2018.

Per film averages also dropped, as there were 246 films released in the first six months, 18 more than the same period a year before. But just six of those — three imported titles (“Avengers: Endgame,” “Bumblebee” and “Captain Marvel”) and three Chinese titles (“The Wandering Earth,” “Crazy Alien” and “Pegasus”) — had earning that broke the RMB1 billion ($145 million) threshold. Just 42 (16 local and 26 imported) broke the RMB100 million ($14.5 million) mark.

Overall, local Chinese films saw their relative performance weaken compared to imported ones in the first six months. Chinese films accounted for 47.5% of the total box office, with earnings of RMB14.8 billion ($2.15 billion). This marked a decline of RMB1.7 billion ($247 million) from the year before.

Chinese reports noted with concern that only one Chinese film has topped the monthly box office so far this year — February’s sci-fi hit “The Wandering Earth.”

The Chinese market overcame a dismal January with more robust sales in February’s hot Chinese New Year period, during which “The Wandering Earth” led in ticket sales to gross a whopping $691 million and become the country’s second most successful film of all time. In March, Taiwanese romantic melodrama “More Than Blue” led with $140 million. “Avengers: Endgame” broke records in April and May with its $614 million haul, single handedly accounting for 55% of China’s total box office in April. “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” and the opening weekend of “Spider-Man: Far From Home” propped up the box office in June.

It wa snot only the Chinese titles that underperformed. Several of the anticipated Hollywood titles also failed to live up to expectations. They included “Shazam!,” “X-Men: Dark Phoenix,” “Men in Black: International,” “Toy Story 4” and “Aladdin.”

This bodes poorly for the rest of the summer, particularly after government interference pushed back releases for two of the season’s most hotly anticipated films, war epic “The Eight Hundred” and youth drama “Better Days.”

Last summer, China had five films that made over RMB1 billion ($145 million), but it will be difficult to match that tally in 2019. Only 58 are scheduled for release this July and August, a sharp decrease from 77 films last year, according to Maoyan. Among local films, big budget contenders include sci-fi film “Shanghai Fortress” and Bona’s firefighting rescue flick “The Bravest,” but almost no others.

Several weeks in July and August are in many years unofficial blackout months during which China protects its local industry by halting imports of foreign fare. But unusually, numerous U.S. titles are lined up this year. They include “The Secret Life of Pets 2” on July 5, “The Lion King” on July 12, “Fighting with My Family” on July 19, “UglyDolls” on August 9, and the Universal-distributed “Yesterday” on August 16.

China has announced theatrical runs for “The Angry Birds Movie 2” and “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” but not yet set release dates. It remains to be seen whether Quentin Tarantino’s Bona-backed “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” which debuts stateside July 26, will hit the Chinese big screen.

[GeneChing]

Netflix Expands Chinese Content With Series, Film Additions (https://variety.com/2019/digital/asia/netflix-expands-chinese-content-series-film-additions-1203261955/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/cities-of-last-things.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF CHANGHE FILMS

Global streaming giant Netflix is growing its Chinese-language content with six new licensed titles. These will arrive on the service in the second half of 2019.

Netflix is not permitted by China to operate its video streaming platform there. But it nevertheless perceives an appetite for Chinese-language content that can be accessed by international audiences, viewers in Chinese-speaking parts of Asia, and overseas Chinese. Netflix’s first Chinese-language original series are expected to launch over the next few months, including “Nowhere Man,” “Triad Princess,” and “The Ghost Bride.”

The six upcoming Chinese-language licensed series and films lean heavily on productions from Taiwan and Hong Kong. They include an expansion of “A Thousand Goodnights,” from Taiwan’s Sanlih TV; the previously announced pickup of Taiwanese art house thriller “Cities of Last Things”; and”Sexy Central,” a female-led drama from Hong Kong’s China 3D Digital.

“Goodnights,” the story of a daughter carrying out her father’s wish, discovering her roots and embarking on a journey around Taiwan, is already available on the platform. Episodes 11-20 will launch on Aug. 10. “Cities” is an award-winning dystopian thriller, told in reverse chronological order, that launched at the Toronto festival last September. It will be available on Netflix from Thursday.

“Pili Fantasy: War of Dragons,” Season 1, is a popular glove puppetry show from Taiwan that has run since 1988. The first season depicts a story where turmoil looms in the Martial World, and the Eight Wonders of the Evil Dragon unleashes dark forces. The show is licensed from Pili International Multimedia, and available on Netflix from Friday.

The “Mayday Life” fact-based movie follows Taiwanese mega-band Mayday on its “Life Tour” concert series, recorded live in 55 cities and 122 shows. Shot over two years across four continents, the show attempts to link together four stories. The movie chronicles the beginnings of one of Asia’s biggest and most popular bands, allows viewers along for the ride, and reflects upon life and friendship. Licensed from B’in Music, “Mayday” will be available on Netflix in August.

“Til Death Do Us Part,” licensed from MirrorFiction, is a suspenseful anthology series spanning seven stories that explore one’s fears and desires when everything we have is at stake. It will be available on Netflix from Aug. 15.

Over the past year, Netflix has acquired Chinese-language content including films and TV series including “Dear Ex,” “Green Door,” “Us and Them,” mainland Chinese sci-fi hit film “The Wandering Earth,” “Meteor Garden” “The Defected,” “On Children,” and “The Rise of Phoenixes.”

THREADS
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Chinese and HK Television Series (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68972-Chinese-and-HK-Television-Series)

[GeneChing]

BUSINESS
China Opens Door for Foreign Movie Theater Chains, But Will They Enter? (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-opens-door-foreign-movie-theater-chains-but-will-they-enter-1223076)
2:58 PM PDT 7/9/2019 by Patrick Brzeski

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2019/07/chinese_president_xi_jinping_-getty-h_2019_.jpg
Mark Schiefelbein - Pool/Getty Images
Chinese President Xi Jinping

The country with the world's largest potential moviegoing audience appears to be inviting foreign investment right as growth in the sector finally begins to slow.

After years of restrictions on virtually every front of its massive film sector, China has cracked the door open to foreign movie theater chains.

On June 30, China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) issued an update to its so-called "Negative List," the official government document that outlines which industries are out of bounds for foreign investment. The number of sectors and sub-sectors on the list was cut from 2018's total of 48 to 40 this year. The new 2019 list removed investment restrictions on industries ranging from oil exploration to farming, as well as one significant change for the entertainment business: A restriction stipulating that "the construction and operation of cinemas must be controlled by a Chinese party" was dropped.

The timing of the changes — just days after President Donald Trump met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the G20 summit and pledged to back down from threatened tariff increases — struck many in the industry as an encouraging sign that Beijing's trade war retaliations wouldn't be engulfing Hollywood's vital China business anytime soon. (HBO Asia's Taiwanese original series The World Between Us received permission from Chinese regulators to stream on Tencent Video the same week, offering encouragement that Beijing may have lifted a recent freeze on U.S. video content approvals.)

"In the context of the trade war, there is a tendency for small concessions to be made here and there, and this is probably one of them," says Mathew Alderson, a partner at Harris Bricken Attorneys & Consultants in Beijing. "It's hard to imagine that they would have taken this step had that meeting resulted in an escalation of tensions."

Exactly what the new rules allow remains somewhat unclear, however. Although the "operation and construction" of cinemas by foreign firms appears to be permitted now, ambiguous wording retained elsewhere in the document leaves unresolved the question of whether movie theaters in China can be directly owned by international parties, or under what ownership structures. (Does the usual requirement of entering into a joint venture with a Chinese firm still hold, for example? And just how large can the foreign party's share of the business be in practice?)

"Flexibility in interpretation and implementation is a familiar strategy from Beijing," adds Alderson. "We won't fully know what's possible until some international companies actually try to work through this system and we see how it is applied."

How much opportunity for growth is left for foreign firms to capitalize on in China's massive exhibition sector is another question. "You certainly can't say that companies going into theater construction in China now will be getting in on the ground floor," points out Lindsay Connor, a partner at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, who regularly represents Chinese studios in international deals.

Over the past two decades, China's theatrical exhibition footprint has exploded from hundreds of screens to a network totaling more than 64,000 — the largest and most state-of-the-art exhibition outlay of any country on the planet. Beijing-based Dalian Wanda Group, both China's and the world's largest exhibitor, already has a multiplex occupying prime real estate in virtually every major Chinese city.

Meanwhile, most indicators suggest China's great theater-building boom is finally reaching a leveling-off point — and that the sector could even be ailing. "It's significant that this announcement has come now, because what we see is that the Chinese industry is in transition," says Rance Pow, president of Shanghai-based cinema consulting firm Artisan Gateway.

In the first half of 2019, ticket sales revenue in China fell 2.7 percent compared to the same period last year, according to Artisan Gateway's data. Most observers have blamed the drop on a downturn in domestic film production caused by Beijing's tax crackdown and censorship uptick over the past year, along with other domestic financing challenges. But an increase in average ticket prices — from RMB 35.6 ($5.17) in 2018 to RMB 38.6 ($5.61) this year — has masked a more worrying trend: a 10.3 percent decline in total admissions in the first half of the year, and a 16.7 percent slip in the average box office revenue generated per movie screen.

"We're starting to see what looks like the beginnings of a consolidation stage in the Chinese exhibition industry, which would be led by the failure of some smaller companies, and at some point bigger failures of business," Pow says.

It's perhaps natural, then, that Beijing is suddenly more receptive to bringing in some international resources and operational best practices — especially since the domestic champions are already so well-entrenched.

Despite the difficulties — both those perennial to doing business in China, and the cyclical downturn — it's unlikely that the major international theater chains will eschew Beijing's invitation altogether, as ambiguous as it may still be. China may already have 50 percent more movie screens than North America (approximately 64,900, compared with 40,300), but its population is more than four times that of the U.S. (1.39 billion compared to 327 million).

Adds Connor: "The Chinese market has been substantially serviced by the rapid rise of local theater companies, but it's still far too big a market to ignore. I suspect every major theater company will be giving this a very hard look."

I thought PRC companies already owned all the major U.S. theater chains. :rolleyes:

[GeneChing]

China Box Office: 'Lion King' Dethroned by Local Family Film, 'Spider-Man: Far From Home' Hits $200M (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-lion-king-dethroned-spider-man-hits-200m-1225986)
1:59 AM PDT 7/22/2019 by Patrick Brzeski

The heartwarming Chinese drama 'Looking Up' proved to be the market's preferred family film this weekend.

Chinese family film Looking Up, co-directed by and starring Deng Chao, delivered on its early buzz to swiftly unseat Disney's The Lion King from its perch atop China's box office.

After several days of escalating nationwide previews, Looking Up officially opened Thursday to $9.2 million, then added a healthy $38.6 million from Friday through Sunday. Thanks to those expansive previews, the film had totaled $62 million by the end of Sunday, according to box office tracker Artisan Gateway.

A heartwarming drama, Looking Up follows a Chinese astronaut who, after losing contact with Earth, drifts through space reminiscing about the generosity and educational upbringing he received from his single dad (played by Deng, a local fan favorite from The Mermaid, Duckweed and other hits). The film is produced by Deng's company Tianjin Chengzi Yingxiang Media, with Enlight Media, Maoyan, Tencent Pictures and Dadi Films also holding stakes.

Jon Favreau's The Lion King, meanwhile, slipped 62 percent from its $55 million opening last week to pull in $20.8 million for its second frame. The CGI juggernaut has climbed to $97.1 million and should run out of gas somewhere around the $130 million mark in the coming weeks. That's a respectable, if somewhat middle-of-the road, finish for a Disney mega-tentpole in China, but still better than most of the studio's other recent remakes in the market: Aladdin ($53 million), Dumbo ($22 million), Beauty and the Beast ($85.7 million ) and The Jungle Book ($150 million).

Holdover Hong Kong crime thriller The White Storm 2: Drug Lords, starring Andy Lau, added $13.9 million in its third weekend. The film has earned $171.7 million, the market's sixth best showing this year.

Local animation Nezha, an adaptation of a classic work of Chinese literature, crept into fourth place. The film doesn't officially open until Friday, but it's already generating momentum and significant earnings thanks to a cross-country roadshow of previews — an increasingly common marketing strategy in China during the summer holiday and Chinese New Year blockbuster periods.

Coming in fifth for the weekend, Sony Pictures' Spider-Man: Far From Home swung past the $200 million mark, earning $3.6 million in its fourth weekend. The film is Hollywood's second-biggest earner in China in 2019, behind only Avengers: Endgame ($614 million).

Didn't see that one coming.

Here's our Spider-Man: Far From Home (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1494) coverage.

Thought we had threads on The White Storm 2: Drug Lords & Nezha too, but couldn't find them.

[GeneChing]

I really could have sworn that I started a Nezha thread, but all there is on this 2019 film is the post from our Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising) thread, so I'm splitting this off for that indie Nezha thread (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71408-Nezha). We have a few references across this forum but none to this new film until now. :o


China Box Office: 'Nezha' Smashes Animation Records With $91.5M Opening (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-nezha-sets-animation-record-1227541)
4:19 AM PDT 7/29/2019 by Patrick Brzeski

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2019/07/nezha.jpg
Courtesy of Horgos Coloroll
'Nezha'

The feature debut of Chinese filmmaker Yang Yu, 'Nezha' is well positioned to overtake Disney's 'Zootopia' ($236 million) as China's biggest animated film ever.

Beijing Enlight's big-budget 3D animation film Nezha opened to a historic $91.5 million at China's box office over the weekend, smashing a slew of records for an animated film in the country.

Thanks to the huge start, Nezha ranked number two at the global box office for the weekend even though it was screening only in China. Disney's The Lion King was the only film to go bigger, clawing in $142.8 million from dozens of markets around the world.

The feature debut of Chinese director Yang Yu, Nezha's records for an animated feature include biggest opening day ($21.1 million, topping Despicable Me 3), largest single-day total ($33.3 million, beating Disney film Zootopia's $25 million) and the top opening weekend overall ($91.5 million, crushing Despicable Me 3's $64 million start in 2017).

Nezha proved especially powerful on Imax, earning $7.7 million from 618 screens — the biggest animated Imax opening in China and the biggest ever July opening for a film of any category.

The film's social scores are among the best ever for a Chinese film. Its user rating on Maoyan sits at 9.7/10 and its score from Douban's notoriously picky but influential users is 8.7/10. Including its roadshow preview screenings in the two weeks leading up to Friday's release, Nezha's overall total was $102.6 million Sunday.

Given the rave word of mouth and current momentum, Zootopia's all-time China animation record of $235.6 million looks well within sight.

The film is based on a young male character from Chinese mythology, who appears in some of the country's best known works of classic literature, such as The Investiture of the Gods and Journey to the West. In Nezha, Yang has given the story a coming-of-age spin, as the young character fights to overcome prejudice and pursue his dreams — themes that appear to be clicking with China's filmgoing youth.

Last weekend's top title, family comedy drama Looking Up, returned to Earth with $17.3 million in its second frame. The film, about an astronaut who reflects on his father's teachings while marooned in space, has earned $106.7 million after 10 days.

Bona Film Group's hotly anticipated firefighter hero film The Bravest scored $7.8 million in third place thanks to packed limited preview screenings. The film unfurls Aug. 1 and early word of mouth augurs a blazing debut.

Disney's The Lion King added $5.8 million in its third weekend. The global juggernaut appears to be running out of steam in China. It has earned a healthy $114.5 million to date.

Further down in fifth place, Beijing Culture's coming-of-age comedy Dancing Elephant opened to just $4.7 million — a pricey flop for the hit-making studio behind 2019's biggest Chinese film, The Wandering Earth ($700 million).

[GeneChing]

I wonder how close China is to being the Largest Export Market for U.S. films?


AUGUST 5, 2019 4:48AM PT
China Becomes Largest Export Market for European Films (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/china-becomes-largest-export-market-for-european-films-2017-1203291692/)
By STEWART CLARKE
International Correspondent
@varietystewart

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/valerian-and-the-city-of-a-thousand-planets.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF STX ENTERTAINMENT

China has replaced North America as the largest export market, by admissions, for European movies, according to Europe’s Audiovisual Observatory.

Research results released Monday show that China accounted for 37% of all admissions to European films outside of Europe itself. At the same time, the number of tickets sold to European movies in North America dropped from 29.8 million to 27.1 million in 2017, or 28% of the total. Latin America accounted for 24% of the European export market.

The Audiovisual Observatory said that a sizable year-on-year increase in admissions in China and ongoing decline in admissions in the U.S. were responsible for China becoming the biggest export market. Ticket sales to European films in the Middle Kingdom grew from 21.2 million in 2016 to 35.8 million in 2017.

“This occurred despite the fact that the Chinese market remains accessible only for a highly limited number of European films, fewer than 30 first releases, and does not (yet) offer realistic market potential for the vast majority of European films,” the report’s authors noted.

In monetary terms, North America remains the most important region for European movie exports, generating 41% of box office receipts.

Luc Besson’s “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” was the European film with the most admissions worldwide, outside Europe. Movies from France and the U.K. were the most popular, accounting for a third apiece. That was a year-on-year decrease, but still significantly ahead of the likes of Spain, which was ranked third, and Russia and Germany, which were placed fourth and fifth, respectively.

[GeneChing]

ASIA NOVEMBER 2, 2019 8:29PM PT
‘Asians are Taking Their Rightful Place in Hollywood’ Says Janet Yang (https://variety.com/2019/digital/asia/asians-taking-rightful-place-in-hollywood-janet-yang-wng-leehom-1203391049/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/10/janet-yang-rexfeatures_6728275j-cr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
Janet Yang Film producer Janet Yang, head of Janet Yang Productions, speaks following a contract signing event held as part of the Beijing International Film Festival in Beijing . Chinese and foreign film producers, companies and investment firms signed movie cooperation deals worth 13.8 billion RMB ($2.3 billion) on Monday, demonstrating how foreign movie makers increasingly want a piece of the growing Chinese marketChina Beijing Film Festival Deals, Beijing, China
CREDIT: MARK SCHIEFELBEIN/AP/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK

“Borders are collapsing all around us,” says producer Janet Yang, who programs the Asia Society’s U.S.-Asia Entertainment Summit conference next week in Los Angeles. “That process is being driven by changes in content and technology.”

The summit this year has notably broadened its focus from one on U.S.-China relations to one that examines the entertainment business to a wider U.S.-Asia perspective.

The conference’s altered angel of attack may reflect a waning American interest in China, now that Chinese firms are no longer buying up Hollywood corporate assets at inflated prices.

And with the polarizing effects of 22 weeks of anti-Beijing protests in Hong Kong, and a year-long U.S.-China trade war, a China focus might also be too sensitive. U.S. entities such as the NBA, Quentin Tarantino and “South Park” have all clashed with China in recent weeks.

“There are too many other topics. Business goes on. The pendulum keeps swinging,” says Yang. Nevertheless, one of the summit’s highlights is expected to be the presentation by (Mandarin-speaking) Australian former Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd.

“Streaming increasingly means that you can make something that is authentically yours. You don’t have to try to please everyone,” says Yang, but the global reach of platforms means that creators can connect with audiences no matter how far away or scattered. “Streaming is good for diversity. A theatrical release is no longer necessarily the only option.”

Alibaba Pictures Los Angeles-based president Zhang Wei is expected to speak about the new ways in which to reach China’s massive audience. During an on-stage interview, Zhang will share details of how “Capernaum,” Nadine Labacki’s Palestine-set drama, was helped to an $12 million gross in China.

Yang says too that Asians are finally achieving a more interesting and meaningful place in Hollywood. “The changes of the last couple of years are not just imagination,” she says.

That topic will be explored more thoroughly by Daniel Dae Kim, the Korean star of lost who now heads his own Hollywood based production company 3AD Media in a presentation. Others speaking on the same topic will include CJ Entertainment’s Francis Chung, Tencent Pictures’ Rob Ree, “Crazy Rich Asians” associate producer Janice Chua, and Disney’s Mark Zee.

Bringing the sessions to a climax will be the wildly-popular Chinese-American singer and actor Wang Leehom. His chosen topics are bridging cultures, and making change happen.

Variety is a media partner of the conference.

Wonder if there will be more news coming out of this conference...

[GeneChing]

...okay, that's not true. i love to say 'i told ya so'. doesn't everyone? :cool:


NOVEMBER 7, 2019 3:02AM PT
Asia Pacific Is World’s No. 1 Box Office Region (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/asia-pacific-box-office-number-one-china-1203396502/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/08/2505_d057_00403_0407rv2_comp.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: PHOTO CREDIT: DANIEL SMITH/UNIVE

The $16.7 billion Asia Pacific market is the world’s No. 1 box office region, commanding a 40.6% share of the global total despite trade tensions between the U.S. and China, MPA and former Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd said at the Asia Society’s U.S.-Asia Entertainment Summit in Los Angeles.

“Whether you like it or not, U.S.-China relations are affecting the Asia Pacific region big-time” and will be the key factor shaping its future in 2020 both geopolitically and in terms of the entertainment industry, Rudd said. Unfortunately, that relationship is “getting to be increasingly difficult at a structural level” as the dynamic is “taking an increasingly ideological turn.”

Nevertheless, Rudd expressed a measured optimism that, given the U.S. and China’s interdependence, “to say we are on a path towards economic decoupling is a vast overstatement of reality.”

In Rudd’s estimation, a Phase One trade deal is “highly probable,” possibly by Thanksgiving – particularly since “Trump doesn’t want to tank the economy in an election year.” A Phase Two deal would be harder but is “still probable” next year, Rudd said. The lack of one would have “a wounding effect on global confidence.”

Against this troubling backdrop of uncertainty and other local disputes between China and its neighbors, “the good news is that more people are going to the cinema than ever before in Asia. There’s no question about that,” said MPA president Michael Ellis.

Based on data from Oxford Economics, Ellis said that last year, the film and TV industries made $48.4 billion in direct contributions to China’s GDP and boosted total employment by 4.7 million jobs. In Japan, those industries directly contributed $22.53 billion to Japan’s GDP and added 521,000 jobs, while in South Korea they contributed $7.53 billion and 315,400 total jobs.

China continues to add more than two dozen new movie screens a day, but it also still sees just one average admission per head, while South Korea, a more mature market, sees four. Despite its smaller population, South Korea has more screens per head than either China or Japan, as well as the most VOD penetration per capita, at 38%, compared to just 14% in China and 13% in Japan.

Additional data showed that South Korea exported a total of $600 million worth of film and TV products last year, about 31% of which were film products and 69% were TV products. The South Korean animation sector employs 5,600 people, accounting for 16% of direct employment within the film industry.

The top three American films in China so far this year have been “Avengers: Endgame” ($597 million), “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” ($202 million) and “Spider-Man: Far From Home” ($199 million). The top three in Japan so far have been been a clean sweep for Disney: “Aladdin” ($97 million), “Toy Story 4” ($74 million) and “The Lion King” ($69 million).

Last year, nine films earned more in China than the U.S. These included two superhero flicks (“Venom” and “Aquaman”), two Dwayne Johnson vehicles (“Rampage” and “Skyscraper”), sci-fi action titles “Pacific Rim: Uprising” and “Ready Player One,” actioner “Tomb Raider,” U.S.-China co-production “The Meg,” and “Johnny English Strikes Again,” on the back of Rowan Atkinson’s popularity in the mainland.

So far this year, there have been four films that have performed better in China than stateside: “Transformers” spinoff “Bumblebee,” “Alita: Battle Angel,” “Godzilla, King of the Monsters,” and “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw.”

In meetings with Chinese officials, criticism was often leveled at Hollywood for making commercial blockbusters like those listed, rather than “more family-oriented films,” Ellis admitted. But, he said, “it’s a business, and those numbers tell the story. This is what the audience likes to see, and as long as audiences like these movies, we’ll make them.”

Animation stood out this year as traveling well around Asia, Ellis noted.

[GeneChing]

DECEMBER 18, 2019 1:28AM PT
China’s Box Office Total Breaks All-Time Record (https://variety.com/2019/film/news/china-box-office-breaks-all-time-record-cinema-ne-zha-wandering-earth-1203447147/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/the-wandering-earth-chinese-sci-fi-movie.jpg?w=1000&h=562&crop=1
CREDIT: COURTESY OF CHINA FILM GROUP

The Chinese box office has broken its all-time yearly record, with local films accounting for eight of the top 10 movies so far in 2019 and a few more anticipated releases yet to come. The previous record total, set last year, of RMB60.7 billion – $8.67 billion at current conversion rates – was overtaken last Friday, according to data from online ticketing agency Maoyan.

With nearly two weeks to go until the end of the year, and a clutch of big titles to be released during the busy Christmas season, 2019’s takings could show several percentage points of growth from last year. Maoyan chose not to issue a forecast, noting that some 2019 releases remain fluid even at this late stage.

The record-breaking haul seemed an unlikely outcome throughout the first half of the year, when the local industry was dogged by uncertainty caused by the Fan Bingbing tax scandal. That triggered a sharp slowdown in production from mid-2018, as well as financial difficulties for studios large and small.

The crucial Chinese New Year period in early 2019 did deliver a record total and a breakthrough for Chinese sci-fi, with “The Wandering Earth” taking RMB4.66 billion ($665 million). But the total did not match the rate of cinema construction, and the season included several disappointments.

Summer was rescued by the unexpected performance of Chinese animated film “Nezha,” which achieved RMB4.97 billion ($710 million), making it China’s second-highest-grossing film ever. And the early autumn, which included a clutch of patriotic movies with releases intended to coincide with the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic, turned into blockbuster season. Winners were “My People, My Country” and “The Captain” (previously known as “The Chinese Pilot”). It also threw up the unlikely breakthrough of oft-delayed “Better Days,” a local film that got yanked at the last minute from the Berlin Film Festival because of Chinese censors.

Among foreign titles, the only two to figure in the year’s current top 10 are “Avengers: Endgame” and “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw.”

Maoyan noted that this year has seen a marked polarization of the Chinese box office. “Nezha” and “Wandering Earth” together account for nearly one sixth of the entire annual total. “China needs more high-quality movies to drive the steady growth of the box office,” it said in an announcement. It highlighted “Song of Youth,” “The Legend of Hei” and “White Snake” as examples of low- and mid-budget successes.

THREADS
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Avengers: Endgame (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71016-Avengers-Endgame)
Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71193-Hobbs-amp-Shaw)
The Wandering Earth (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71046-The-Wandering-Earth)
Nezha (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71408-Nezha)

[GeneChing]

It's not like this should surprise anyone. It's been the point of this here thread, and my former column, for years now. And if I could see it coming from over a decade ago, how hard could it have been to predict?


DECEMBER 24, 2019 5:06AM PT
China’s Box Office Went Its Own Way in 2019, to Hollywood’s Detriment (https://variety.com/2019/film/asia/hollywood-2019-setback-china-box-office-1203451505/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/china-global.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: NETFLIX

It wasn’t just “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” — with its dismal $12 million opening weekend — that was a Middle Kingdom misfire for Hollywood in 2019. When year-end figures for the China box office are confirmed next week, it’s likely that only two Hollywood titles will be among the 10 top-grossing titles of 2019, compared to five out of 10 last year and overwhelming market domination not so long before that.

“This has to be the worst performance for Hollywood in China since 2008,” said Chris Fenton, previously China-based head of motion pictures at DMG and now senior advisor to IDW Media Holdings and a trustee of the U.S.-Asia Institute. As recently as 2012 and 2013, Fenton recalls, there were weekends “when 90% of the box office in China was from foreign films… China used to tax its exhibitors if they generated more than 50% box office from foreign films. That’s not needed anymore.”

Instead, locally produced blockbusters such as sci-fi epic “The Wandering Earth” and animated hit “Nezha” are luring far more moviegoers into Chinese theaters than foreign-made films.

Whether Hollywood will actually record a net decrease in earnings from China for the first time in possibly a decade is still unclear. The overall year-on-year growth of the Chinese box office has often masked the softening appeal of Hollywood movies. But that expansion has slowed to a single-digit percentage, and the Chinese yuan has weakened against the U.S. greenback, shrinking Hollywood’s earnings in dollars.

Exhibition and distribution consultancy Artisan Gateway is forecasting that the overall Chinese market will reach RMB63.5 billion ($9.06 billion) this year, a gain of 4.1% in local currency terms. But that is likely to be more than offset by the 6% fall of the yuan from RMB6.58 to the dollar a year ago, to RMB7.01 today.

Artisan Gateway data already show the market share of Chinese films rising from 62% in 2018 to 65% in 2019. That has come largely at the expense of Hollywood titles, which are down to 31% so far this year, compared to 34% last year. The figure could drop below 30% in the final calculation.

The tumble is even more discouraging given that 2019 was actually supposed to offer an opportunity for Hollywood to make up the lost ground. The Fan Bingbing tax scandal had led to a production slowdown from mid-2018, and caused severe financial difficulties for many Chinese movie studios.

In the end, however, only “Avengers: Endgame” and “Fast and Furious: Hobbs and Shaw” made this year’s top 10 list. China can no longer be expected to lap up American duds and act as a box-office safety net for tired franchises, which had been the case in recent years. Raymond Zhou, a China-based industry consultant, describes that as a “growing maturity of Chinese audiences.”

Both Zhou and Artisan Gateway chief Rance Pow say that Chinese box office is particularly top heavy, or hit-driven. “Only about 3% of titles gross RMB1 billion or more, an observation we’ve made since 2017,” said Pow. “Those titles grossing RMB1 billion are also accounting for an increasing share of China’s annual box office: 43% in 2017; 54% in 2018; and an estimated 55% in 2019.”

The locally made hits are now coming in a variety of genres, in a reflection of growing Chinese creativity.

“Forecasts at the beginning of 2019 did not take into account the dark horses such as ‘Nezha,’ which is arguably the best Chinese animation film ever; ‘The Wandering Earth,’ which is a milestone for Chinese sci-fi; ‘Better Days,’ the best teenage movie in a long, long time; and even ‘My People, My Country,’ the best anthology film and a government-encouraged [patriotic] film that most resonated with the public,” says Zhou. “There is not a single Chinese franchise movie in the year’s top 10 box-office list.”

Another structural change is likely to make it hard for Hollywood to quickly reverse its declining market share: a shift in audience demographics thanks to China’s cinema-building spree. According to Artisan Gateway, nearly 20,000 new screens opened in China this year, pushing the total to about 80,000. The majority of the new screens are in small towns and rural areas, often described as Tier 4 or Tier 5 cities, where audiences are less well-traveled, less affluent and more attuned to local rather than foreign content.

“The more screens China builds, the more the public taste will be skewed towards domestic fare, percentage-wise,” says Zhou.

The only upside for Hollywood in that scenario is that Chinese authorities may feel less need to shore up local market share by excluding U.S. films through import quotas. “As Chinese-language films generally over-index in rural markets, pressure limiting foreign-title importation could relax,” says Pow.

However, Hollywood titles are not necessarily the only beneficiaries of that scenario. In 2018, Indian films made notable inroads in China. In 2019, it was the turn of Japanese films (with a 2.9% share) and Italian ones.

“China could probably do away with the quotas,” said Fenton. “More Hollywood movies in the market would probably still generate roughly the same box office result. The extra films would probably just cannibalize each other.”

He added: “In a way, it seems like the Communist Party’s master plan – of using protectionist policies to develop their homegrown product for their own film industry – worked out pretty well.”

[GeneChing]

China Now Has Over 68,000 Movie Screens (http://chinafilminsider.com/headlines-from-china-china-now-has-almost-80000-movie-screens/)
BY CHINAFILMINSIDER DEC 23, 2019

http://chinafilminsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/movie-theater.png

China Now Has Over 68,000 Movie Screens

As of December 23, China has 68,922 movie screens nationwide including 8843 screens newly built in 2019, according to the data from the National Committee of Film Development Fund. In addition, China’s total box office earnings has reached RMB 62.7 billion with 63% of earnings generated by domestic films. 15 films, including 10 domestic films, crossed the RMB 1 billion mark. At the beginning of this year, China already overtook North America to own the largest number of movie screens in the world.

As was foretold...


Number of U.S. Movie Screens (https://www.natoonline.org/data/us-movie-screens/)
Year Indoor Drive-In Total
2019 40,613 559 41,172

[GeneChing]

Not Even ‘Star Wars’ Can Save This Year’s Box Office (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/22/movies/star-wars-box-office.html)
In 2019, Hollywood put out a whopping 58 franchise films, including “The Rise of Skywalker,” released this weekend. Still, ticket sales dropped.

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2019/12/23/arts/22box-starwars/22box-starwars-jumbo-v2.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp
Daisy Ridley as Rey in “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker,” which arrived to $175.5 million in domestic ticket sales over the weekend.Credit...Lucasfilm/Disney

By Brooks Barnes and Nicole Sperling
Published Dec. 22, 2019
Updated Dec. 24, 2019

LOS ANGELES — Cue the sad trombone: Movie ticket sales in the United States and Canada will total roughly $11.45 billion for the year, a 4 percent decrease from 2018.

That preliminary estimate, released by Comscore on Sunday, took into account the $175.5 million collected by “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” (Disney) over the weekend. “Rise of Skywalker” got off to a soft start compared to “The Last Jedi,” which took in $220 million over its first few days in domestic theaters in 2017.

Hollywood’s 2019 lineup included one behemoth fantasy after another, including “Frozen II” (Disney), “The Lion King” (Disney), “Toy Story 4” (Disney), “Aladdin” (Disney), “Captain Marvel” (Disney) and “Avengers: Endgame” (Disney), which broke attendance records.

But moviegoers also rejected an astounding amount of what Hollywood served up.

Tom Hooper’s critically reviled “Cats” collapsed over the weekend, collecting $6.5 million at North American theaters after costing roughly $100 million to make, not including marketing expenses. At Hooper’s request, Universal sent theaters a version of “Cats” with slight special effects improvements over the weekend. Ticket buyers gave “Cats” a C-plus grade in CinemaScore exit polls.

Misfires from earlier in the year included “Dark Phoenix,” the latest in the threadbare “X-Men” series; Ang Lee’s ill-advised “Gemini Man,” starring Will Smith; “UglyDolls,” an animated clunker based on a toy line; and a pop-feminist reboot of “Charlie’s Angels,” with Kristen Stewart.


Ty Burr
✔
@tyburr
There are moments in CATS I would gladly pay to unsee, including baby mice with the faces of human girls and a chorus line of cockroach Rockettes. Anyone who takes small children to this movie is setting them up for winged-monkey levels of night terrors.https://www.bostonglobe.com/2019/12/18/arts/claws-out/ …

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‘Oh God, my eyes’: Read Ty Burr’s scathing review of ‘Cats’ - The Boston Globe
A triumph of vulgar, wrongheaded “showmanship.”

bostonglobe.com
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4:37 PM - Dec 18, 2019
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Nine movies from Warner Bros. stumbled out of the gate, including “The Goldfinch,” “The Kitchen,” “Shaft,” “Motherless Brooklyn” and “Richard Jewell,” which gave Clint Eastwood his worst opening weekend as a filmmaker in four decades.

“It’s hard to know if this is a secular, permanent phenomenon related to audience viewing habits or movie title-specific,” said David Gross, who runs Franchise Entertainment Research, a film consultancy.

The movie business is cyclical, and ending the year a few hundred million dollars behind 2018 is hardly a catastrophe — not when theaters are competing with a fast-growing array of streaming services. One of the most discussed films of the year, Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman,” largely bypassed theaters, playing instead on Netflix. “The Irishman” and two other Netflix films, “Marriage Story” and “The Two Popes” were showered with Golden Globe nominations. Those three films are also seen as major Oscar contenders.

Just four percent down? At a time when the “Star Wars” franchise expanded into live-action television for the first time with “The Mandalorian” on Disney Plus?

“Hallelujah,” you can almost hear film executives saying.

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2019/11/28/arts/knivesout-anatomy2/knivesout-anatomy2-jumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp
“Knives Out,” with a starry ensemble cast, was one of the few non-franchise films to do well at the box office. Credit...Claire Folger/Lionsgate

Joe Drake, the chairman of the Lionsgate Motion Picture Group, said the competition for intellectual property and talent “is more heated than ever, but we doubled our box office this year and increased our market share.”

Lionsgate found success by deploying Keanu Reeves in “John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum,” Gerard Butler in “Angel Has Fallen,” Tyler Perry in “A Madea Family Funeral” and a bevy of stars in “Knives Out.” (Seth Rogen and Charlize Theron couldn’t save the Lionsgate comedy “Long Shot” from living up to its title, however.)

To compete in theaters, non-franchise films have to be definitive — what Drake called “great stories well told that announce themselves.” “Knives Out,” starring Daniel Craig and Ana de Armas, did not bring anything particularly new — it’s an old-fashioned whodunit — but it was a perfectly executed example of the genre.

“We genuinely believe that there is a false narrative about midrange movies,” Drake said. “They are not going extinct.”

But if a movie has flaws, there is no longer a floor. No amount of marketing hocus-pocus could convince people that “The Sun Is Also a Star,” a middling romantic comedy starring Yara Shahidi (“grown-ish”), was worth the hassle and expense of trekking to a theater.
continued next post

[GeneChing]

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2019/12/22/arts/22box-us/merlin_152238339_93e3cc26-8cfd-4772-ba38-5a71b37aabb3-jumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp
“Us” was a hit for Universal, earning $255 million worldwide. Credit...Claudette Barius/Universal Pictures

Every studio ended the year with a few hits, including Warner, which struck a cultural nerve with “Joker” ($1.1 billion worldwide). Jennifer Lopez and her savvy stripper friends (“Hustlers,” $157 million) propped up STX. “Rocketman” ($195 million) helped Paramount return to annual profitability for the first time in memory. Jordan Peele’s cerebral horror film “Us” ($255 million), Danny Boyle’s Beatles-oriented “Yesterday” ($151 million) and the “Fast and Furious” spinoff “Hobbs & Shaw” ($759 million) kept Universal competitive.

When all ticket sales are counted, Sony Pictures is expected to be the only studio — aside from Disney — to land two movies in the top 10. “Spider-Man: Far From Home,” riding on “Avengers” coattails, collected $391 million in North America and $1.13 billion worldwide. “Jumanji: The Next Level,” released on Dec. 13, is performing like “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” which earned $404 million at domestic theaters in 2017. Sony also struck gold with Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood” ($372 million worldwide).

“This year was dominated by major franchises, but we’ve also seen the hunger for original content,” said Shawn Robbins, chief analyst for BoxOffice.com, citing Tarantino’s comedic drama as an example.

Even so, calling the film business healthy would be a stretch.

The box office is increasingly divided into haves — franchises, mostly aging ones — and have-nots (everything else). Studios churned out a whopping 58 franchise films this year, which consumed 82 percent of the worldwide Hollywood box office, according to Gross’s film consultancy. Eighty-one non-franchise films got the scraps.

Some franchises declined sharply. “The Secret Life of Pets 2” was down 51 percent from its series predecessor. “Terminator: Dark Fate” fell 41 percent.

“Story lines need to move forward, and worlds need to expand,” Gross said. “New characters and conflicts need to emerge.”

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2019/12/23/arts/27harriet-history1/27harriet-history1-jumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp
“Harriet,” starring Cynthia Erivo in the title role, did well for Focus Features.Credit...Glen Wilson/Focus Features

Because moviemaking relies on personal judgment calls, studios try to reduce risk by adhering to rules of thumb. But few choices seem safe anymore.

Original animation used to be a relatively sure bet. This year, mythical creatures (“Missing Link”), an amusement park run by talking animals (“Wonder Park”) and a fox named Swifty (“Arctic Dogs”) got the cold shoulder.

Stephen King sequels are hot (“It: Chapter 2”). Until they’re not (“Doctor Sleep”).

“The market is still very dynamic, but what works is more unpredictable,” said Stephen Gilula, the co-chairman of Fox Searchlight. “The costs have gone up, and the success rate has gone down.”

Searchlight, the Disney-owned art film studio, scored with the summertime horror flick “Ready or Not” ($29 million). Taika Waititi’s “JoJo Rabbit,” a Nazi satire, has earned $20 million and could generate another $5 million to $10 million based on its awards fate. But Searchlight had a very quiet year over all. “Lucy in the Sky” ($320,000), starring Natalie Portman, was an outright flop. Frequent contributors like Wes Anderson were between films.

Between January and Aug. 25, combined ticket sales for the 20 largest art film distributors — Fox Searchlight, Magnolia and the like — fell 45 percent from the same period last year, according to Box Office Mojo data.

A handful of art house offerings ultimately managed to get noticed, including Lulu Wang’s China-set family drama “The Farewell” ($18 million), the elevated A24 horror film “Midsommar” ($27 million), the quirky Huck Finn-style tale “The Peanut Butter Falcon” ($21 million) and Bong Joon Ho’s genre-defying “Parasite” ($21 million).

For the third year running, Focus Features topped the specialty box office. The Universal Pictures subsidiary saw films like “Downton Abbey” ($97 million) and “Harriet” ($42 million) over-perform in ways that seemed to startle even the studio.

“We always thought there would be an excited core audience for ‘Harriet,’ those who have a natural interest in an American icon who shockingly had never had her life story told onscreen,” said Peter Kujawski, the chairman of Focus Features. “But it crossed well past that core audience and broke into the broader culture.”

“Harriet,” directed by Kasi Lemmons, may also figure into the coming Oscar race. Cynthia Erivo, who stars in the film as Harriet Tubman, is a favorite for a best actress nomination.


Correction: Dec. 24, 2019
An earlier version of this article misspelled the name of the director of "The Farewell." It is Lulu Wang, not Lulu Wong.

Brooks Barnes is a media and entertainment reporter, covering all things Hollywood. He joined The Times in 2007 as a business reporter focused primarily on the Walt Disney Company. He previously worked for The Wall Street Journal. @brooksbarnesNYT

Nicole Sperling is a media and entertainment reporter, covering Hollywood and the burgeoning streaming business. She joined The Times in 2019. She previously worked for Vanity Fair, Entertainment Weekly and the Los Angeles Times. @nicsperling

The U.S. is still ahead: $11.45 B to PRC's $9.06 B.

[GeneChing]

The U.S. is still ahead: $11.45 B to PRC's $9.06 B.
Now this is the last bastion of Hollywood global dominence. Will it survive the 2020 assault?


ASIA JANUARY 2, 2020 7:35PM PT
China’s Box Office Hit New Heights in 2019, as Hollywood’s Share Shrank (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/china-box-office-2019-review-ne-zha-wandering-earth-avengers-1203455038/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/05/china-global.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: NETFLIX

Hollywood films had a historically unsuccessful year at the China box office in 2019, data from Chinese authorities and online ticketing platform Maoyan show, although the country’s theatrical revenues rose to a new all-time high.

American titles accounted for just two of the country’s top ten grossers last year, with “Avengers: Endgame” placing third and “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” placing tenth. Meanwhile, nine out of China’s top ten highest grossing films of all time are now Chinese, four of which came out in 2019. “Avengers: Endgame” is the only foreign title to remain on the list.

Yet even without Hollywood, the Chinese market continued to grow. Box office revenue rose 5.4% to a new record of $9.2 billion (RMB64.3 billion) in 2019 — albeit at a slower rate of growth than its 9% rise last year.

Chinese animation “Ne Zha,” Chinese new year sci-fi blockbuster “The Wandering Earth,” and “Avengers” were the top three films of the year, followed by patriotic so-called “main melody” films “My People, My Country” and “The Captain.” Bona Film Group backed four out of year’s top ten grossers.

As of the end of 2019, China now has 69,787 cinema screens, up 9,708 from 2018, according to the Communist party mouthpiece the People’s Daily, which added that more than 1.7 billion tickets were sold. The propagandistic publication went so far as to deem the current moment a “golden age” for the Chinese film industry’s development, as “the market bubble fades… and Chinese films continue to steadily improve.”

One reason is that over the past three years, foreign films have accounted for a shrinking slice of the box office, with Chinese films performing proportionally better. In 2019, Chinese films accounted for 64% of the total box office, or $5.9 million (RMB41.2 billion) in ticket sales — up from 62% in 2018 and 53.8% in 2017. This rise occurred despite there being la smaller percentage difference between the number of films imported in 2019 and the year before, with foreign films making up 22% of 2019’s total number of screened titles.

Other than a few exceptions, including “Avengers: Endgame” and “Frozen 2,” the latest instalments of Hollywood franchises didn’t perform as well their predecessors did in China, indicating audiences eager for something fresh. These included “How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World,” “Jumanji: The Next Level,” “X-Men: Dark Phoenix,” and most recently, “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.”

“Local films are catching up to Hollywood on many indicators like IP, story, special effects and genre, while Hollywood films are caught in a bottleneck period of self-repetition and a lack of originality. [Chinese] audiences’ preference for it will naturally decrease,” wrote Chinese website Mirror Entertainment. Chinese viewers in the past year have also started to favor smaller, realistic imports in the vein of “Green Book,” Lebanon’s “Capernaum” and India’s “Andhadhun,” rather than just big U.S. blockbusters, it noted.

Data from Maoyan for the top 20 performing films of the year showed that Chinese films were rated higher by users, both overall as well as separately for story and special effects.

The most successful new genres in China in 2019 were, in order of year-on-year box office earnings, disaster films (e.g. “The Bravest,” which set a box office new record for genre, “Godzilla: King of the Monsters), biographies (“Chinese Pilot,” which also set a genre record, “Green Book”), fantasy (“Ne Zha,” also a record-setter, “Avengers: Endgame”), sci-fi (“Wandering Earth,” also a genre record high) and animation, according to Maoyan. “Box office success is no longer limited by subject or genre — it’s all about the content,” the ticketing firm said.

Last year, movie-going during the four major holiday periods — Chinese New Year, summer, National Day and the calendar new year — accounted for nearly 50% of the total annual number of trips to the cinema, Maoyan said.

Chinese fare took larger market share last year not because of a sudden bonanza of strong local titles, but because a small handful of hits took the lion’s share. Maoyan showed that over the past three years, the market share of big blockbusters grossing more than RMB2 billion ($287 million) in China has steadily increased from 18.5% of the total box office in 2017 to 29.9% in 2018 and 36.9% last year — on the back of just six films. This rise has come at the expense of mid-level films grossing RMB10 million to RMB2 billion, whose market share has fallen over the same period from 80.5% to 62.3%.

Ten out of the 15 films that made over RMB1 billion ($144 million) last year were Chinese, as were 47 out of the 88 films that made more than RMB100 million ($14.4 million).

Last year, China produced a total of 1,037 films, including 850 narrative feature films, 51 animated films, 74 science and educational titles, 47 documentaries, and 15 specialized movies, according to the National Film Bureau. This is down from the 1,082 films put out in 2018, likely due to production slowdowns brought on by new regulations and tax schemes.

The deeply political nature and implications of success in the world’s second-largest film market was highlighted in official Chinese reports on the 2019 statistics, which took care to single out and emphasize how the “main melody,” jingoistic films from the National Day holiday period were a great success.

A spokesperson for the film bureau told the Chinese press that in 2020, the “vast majority” of people working in film should “thoroughly study and implement the important guiding spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping” so as to advance the film industry.

[GeneChing]

JANUARY 23, 2020 11:13AM PT
How the Wuhan Coronavirus Infected the Chinese Film Industry (https://variety.com/2020/film/asia/wuhan-coronvirus-infected-chinese-film-1203477077/)
By REBECCA DAVIS and PATRICK FRATER

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/01/coronavirus-shutterstock_editorial_10536867a-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: YONHAP/EPA-EFE/SHUTTERSTOCK

Just days ago, no one would have predicted that China’s most lucrative film-going season was about to be derailed by the escalating epidemic of a novel coronavirus that is now rapidly spreading through the country and beyond.

Variety takes a look at how the box office in the world’s second largest film market has been overturned by a public health crisis that has made gathering in enclosed cinema spaces a health risk.

Pre-Sales and Promotion

Earlier this week, it seemed to be business as usual for the Spring Festival holiday release window. Production teams collectively spent a reported $144 million (RMB1 billion) on publicity for the seven blockbusters scheduled to release this Friday and Saturday, the eve and New Year’s Day of the new lunar year of the rat. The holiday is a time for family gatherings, when millions who’ve saved up all year take one of their few vacations, and head back to their hometowns. It is the largest annual human migration in the world.

It seemed that the biggest setback would be a marketing blow to Peter Chan’s volleyball drama “Leap,” which suddenly changed its Chinese title from “Chinese Women’s Volleyball” to “Win the Championship” the day before pre-sales began.

The new name, unknown to viewers bombarded with posters and materials for the other, is the same as the short made by rival director Xu Zheng that was included in the widely viewed propaganda film “My People, My Country,” and has caused confusion. Chan’s title change decision appears to have been a way to avoid fallout from dissatisfaction within the sports community of how the women’s team is portrayed, rather than government censorship.

Pre-sales for the seven films had already reached a reported $67.5 million (RMB468 million) by Thursday morning. “Detective Chinatown 3” had pulled ahead as the front-runner, setting a new pre-sale record by selling more than $14 million (RMB100 million) worth of tickets in just 23 hours.

Monday: Concern Mounts

By Jan. 20, concerns ramp up about the spread of the coronavirus due to mass travel ahead of Chinese New Year, as the death toll and infection tally mounts. Chinese authorities report three deaths and more than 200 cases in the country and confirm that the disease can in fact spread through human-to-human transmission. Since the first case outside of China was discovered on Jan. 13, the virus has spread to Thailand, Japan and South Korea. On Jan. 21, the first reported case is found in the U.S., in Seattle.

Ticket sales in Wuhan were mounting swimmingly before Sunday (Jan. 19), accounting for around 2% of the national box office, on average. But from Sunday onwards, ticket sales rapidly declined, dropping from 2.2% of the national total to 0.5% in the space of three days. From Monday, film company shares begin to fall, including those for Wanda Film and China Film.

On Wednesday (Jan. 22), China’s major ticketing platforms Maoyan and Tao Piaopiao put out official statements announcing unconditional refunds for any tickets bought in Wuhan.

The same day, Chinese authorities announce a quarantine for the entire city of Wuhan and its 11 million residents, effective from the next day. Travel restrictions are planned to shut down public transit out of the city. Chaos ensues as residents fight to get out of the metropolis before lock down sets in Thursday morning at 10AM local time, with Chinese reports estimating that some 300,000 fled.

Thursday: Box Office Meltdown

By Thursday (Jan. 23) morning, the hashtag “Why don’t the spring festival films change their release dates?” is a top trending item on Weibo, China’s Twitter-equivalent. Production teams are faced with a lose-lose decision: risk angering the public by keeping their film in the line-up, or pull out and lose millions in P&A.

Official film Weibo accounts start to slash promotional material and instead boost posts cheering for “frontline medical workers.” Then, in quick succession, all seven issue statements that they are formally withdrawing their titles. No future release dates have been announced.

Animations “Boonie Bears: The Wild Life” and “Jiang Ziya” pulled out first. “Now that the epidemic is happening, we must stand impregnably united, and focus on the disease prevention and saving lives,” the “Jiang Ziya” promo site said. “We salute those working on the front lines of the epidemic and apologize to theater workers nationwide.”

The other titles swiftly follow. “Movies are just a part of life; life and safety are more important, since ‘movies are short and life is long,'” said the team behind “Leap.” It said it was pulling out after “careful consideration of the risk of disease transmission in a confined space.”

Lam’s “The Rescue” was on-brand and adopting the most rousing tone, writing: “At the moment, many medical and rescue personnel are sticking to their posts, stepping forward bravely at the key moment of danger and disaster! The movie ‘The Rescue’ is about exactly this kind of spirit. Let us as millions, all of one mind, with unshakeably unity, win the battle of preventing an epidemic!”

“Lost in Russia” director Xu Zheng wrote a post expressing his gratitude to Hengdian Film, his producer Huanxi Media, and the marketing team, whose early work has been washed away. “All this is less important than eliminating the hidden dangers of the disease!”

Ticketing platforms Maoyan and Tao Piaopiao now promise to refund all tickets without question, a process that may take up to a week. Cinema chains say they have been overwhelmed with calls from patrons asking for refunds.

Cinemas in Wuhan and other nearby locked-down cities have been entirely shut down, and authorities have issued a mandatory face mask policy there for public spaces. Cinemas elsewhere remain operational for the moment, advertising that they have boosted disinfection measures and ventilation for theaters.

Large-scale cultural activities like temple fairs have been cancelled, and cultural institutions such as museums have slashed activities to reduce visitor tallies. The Forbidden City in Beijing will be shuttered from Saturday.

Over the course of the day, China has locked down some 20 million people in Wuhan and neighboring cities by indefinitely banning planes and trains. The death toll has risen to at least 17, with some 517 affected. The virus has now been detected in Japan, Hong Kong, Macau, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam and the U.S. and U.K. The WHO is currently mulling whether to declare the epidemic a global health emergency.

On Thursday – the last chance for business before a recess of five full trading days for the spring festival holiday – shares of a number of major film companies plummeted. Wanda Film closed almost 7% lower after falling 20% over the previous five trading days, and China Film closed nearly 5% lower, down 17% over the past five trading days.

THREADS
2020 Year of the Rat (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71622-2020-Year-of-the-Rat)
The Rescue (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71207-The-Rescue)
Lost in Russia (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71505-Lost-in-Russia)
Detective Chinatown III (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71600-Detective-Chinatown-3)
Legend of Deification (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71621-Legend-of-Deification-Jiang-Ziya)
Coronavirus (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-Wuhan-Pneumonia)
Chollywood rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

Did NOT see this one coming...:(


ASIA FEBRUARY 3, 2020 9:54AM PT
China Indefinitely Halts Film and TV Production Nationwide As Virus Deaths Surpass SARS (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/china-halts-film-production-coronavirus-surpasses-sars-1203490609/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/01/virus-shutterstock_editorial_10541597k-cr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: EYEPRESS NEWS/SIPA/SHUTTERSTOCK

China has officially ordered an indefinite halt to all film production in the country as it seeks to stop the spread of the deadly coronavirus that has swept the nation.

The death toll in China stands at 361 – higher now than that of SARS, which killed 349. China has confirmed 17,205 cases as of Sunday, with numbers rapidly rising, and as of Monday, there are 11 confirmed cases in the U.S.

Over the weekend, the producers’ and actors’ associations of the China Federation of Radio and TV Associations co-issued a notice declaring that all film and TV production companies, crews and actors are to suspend film and TV drama shoots until the unspecified time when the period of heightened virus prevention has passed. Those who don’t stop production will be held “responsible,” it said, without providing further detail.

Film industry professionals have the right to refuse to participate in shoots during the epidemic period, and can report shoots that continue unabated to the local authorities and industry associations.

“This is a necessary move given the current special situation,” the producers’ association’s secretary-general Li Gang told the People’s Daily newspaper.

The notice comes after a number of productions and facilities voluntarily shut themselves down, including the mega studio at Hengdian, which announced last Monday that all productions there would halt, and at the giant Qingdao studios.

Chinese citizens nationwide remain isolated in self-imposed quarantine in their homes, and more than a dozen major metropolises have been under lockdown measures restricting travel. In more than half the country, businesses have been ordered to extend their Chinese new year holiday and not resume working until at least Feb. 10, bringing the economy to a standstill.

Chinese reports predicted a definite decline in the number of films and TV shows produced this year, particularly as the epidemic stretches into the spring, a key period for production. “This and next year, there may be a ‘content shortage’ phenomenon,” assessed a local newspaper from Wuhan, the city at the disease’s epicenter.

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[GeneChing]

ASIAFEBRUARY 13, 2020 6:19AM PT
Chinese Shoots to Resume Despite Virus Threat, While Beijing Throws Industry a Lifeline (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/coronavirus-china-hengdian-studios-1203502111/)
By REBECCA DAVIS

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2016/12/hengdian-production-facility-169.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: BAO KANGXUAN/AP

Hengdian World Studios, one of China’s largest, cautiously reopened for business today after it shut down all production in recent weeks to prevent the spread of the deadly coronavirus.

The move comes a day after Chinese authorities released an official statement pledging government support for the struggling entertainment sector.

Huge portions of the world’s second largest economy have been at a standstill since the virus swept the country. Though work officially began again Monday after an extended holiday for the Chinese new year, many are still working remotely as China continues intensive measures such as travel restrictions to keep a lid on the disease’s spread.

Hengdian had closed off to all tourists on Jan. 25 before shutting down all production on Jan. 27, at a time when Chinese reports estimate 20 crews were filming and 11 preparing to begin.

It will now resume work in stages, the studio said in work guidelines posted Monday night. Those set to resume shooting will be film and TV crews who stayed on-site throughout the Spring Festival period and have had no contact with people from highly infectious areas, as well as production firms “with adequate prevention and control measures in place,” although their eligibility well pend review. Employees in highly infectious areas have been advised to postpone their return.

The next stage of operations will be “determined according to the circumstances of epidemic prevention and control,” it said.

A spokesman for local government in charge of Hengdian’s district told Chinese news outlet Sina Entertainment that though many applications to resume shooting have been filed since Feb. 3, so far, none have been approved. “Resumption of work will have to wait until Zhejiang Province lifts its Grade I [high-level public health emergency] response.”

Given that actors will be unable to wear masks, Chinese reports said shooting teams have been advised to stay small, limiting to 20 people when possible.

On Weibo, China’s Twitter equivalent, TV actress Zhang Lingzhi wrote that when she heard the news of Hengdian re-opening for shoots, she was very concerned for her husband, actor Johnny Chen (“The Climbers”), who has remained confined to his hotel room while his shoot there was halted for the past 15 days.

“Is it really possible to resume work now?” she asked. “[Feeling] so worried, so sad, so helpless.”

The production shutdown has delayed the output of new dramas and put severe financial pressure on firms. With daily actor fees accruing and the possibility of selling completed product postponed, smaller companies with fewer reserves have been particularly hard-hit, as reported by Variety earlier this week.

Beijing breaks silence on entertainment

To address such problems, Beijing’s film bureau said Wednesday that it will provide financial support to production companies and cinemas hard hit by recent cinema closures and production stoppages. It did not, however, provide details as to how or when.

Beijing’s municipal government recently issued two documents outlining measures to support businesses — particularly small and mid-sized enterprises — as they deal with the impact of the capital going into effective lockdown.

Though vague on detail, the Beijing Film Bureau’s statement on Wednesday indicated that it was working to ensure entertainment firms “are connected to these policies and receive practical benefits.”

To protect hard-hit companies, the bureau said it would soon issue “relevant policies to increase support for film and TV cultural enterprises” and subsidize the operating costs of production firms and cinemas “to help companies overcome their difficulties.”

The bureau will also intervene in actual production.

“In order to meet the expectations of audiences across the country, and ensure that there will be adequate theatrical content after the epidemic is over, there is a plan to open a ‘green-light channel’ for the key films of this year and next, and key projects that have been severely affected by the epidemic this year,” it said.

For such films, it promised “financial assistance, creative guidance, filming support, and so on to ensure that important projects will not have to stop, be aborted or lower their standards.”

The bureau also expressed plans to “very proactively solicit film and TV works that reflect achievements in fighting the epidemic and offer subsidies to support them.”

To help streamline censorship and other film approvals and reviews, it said paperwork can now be initiated via an online submission only, and physical documents either delivered in-person at a later date or mailed in. A fast-track for approvals of “special projects” will also be established. The statement noted that its normal review and approval mechanisms hadn’t stalled during the quarantine period.

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[GeneChing]

...I did a cursory search on IMDB and HKMDB and turned up nothing. It's making me ponder the overall effect of COVID-19 on the Chinese film industry.


ASIAFEBRUARY 17, 2020 2:04AM PT
Virus Kills Chinese Film Director and Family in Wuhan (https://variety.com/2020/film/asia/virus-kills-chinese-film-director-family-wuhan-1203505614/)
By VIVIENNE CHOW

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/02/wuhan-hospital-shutterstock_editorial_10557396b-cr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CREDIT: CHINE NOUVELLE/SIPA/SHUTTERSTOCK

A Chinese film director and his entire family have died from the novel coronavirus in Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak.

Chang Kai, a film director and an external communications officer at a Hubei Film Studio subsidiary, died in hospital on Feb. 14 from the virus now called COVID-19, according to a statement from the studio. He was 55.

But Chang’s death was not the first in his family—the Chinese media reported that Chang’s father and mother were infected and died one after the other. Chang and his sister, who looked after their parents at home, were both infected with the virus as a result. His sister died just hours later. Chang’s wife is also infected, still alive, and is still battling the virus in an intensive care unit.

A note written by Chang, said to be his last words, has gone viral on the Chinese Internet. Chang wrote that his father succumbed to the illness on the first day of the Lunar New Year (January 25). “My father had a fever, cough and trouble breathing. [We] tried to send him to the hospital but none of the hospitals we visited took him, because they had no more beds,” he wrote.

Instead, Chang brought his father home where ha died a few days later, having passed on the virus to the other family members. Chang’s note said that he and his wife were denied the opportunity to be treated early. Wuhan built a new hospital in six days, but capacity to handle the virus remains strained. Chang bade farewell to his family, friends and his son, who is reportedly studying in the U.K.

Popular on Variety
Chang enrolled in Wuhan University’s journalism school to study photography in 1989, and joined Hubei Film Studio upon graduation. The studio praised Chang for his contribution to the studio’s development, saying that he was a well-respected colleague and his death was a painful loss.

As of Feb. 17, the virus has infected 71,330 —70,548 in mainland China—and claimed 1,775 lives (1,770 in mainland China), surpassing the death toll of SARS in 2003.



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ASIA MARCH 2, 2020 5:14AM PT
China’s Box Office Loses Up to $214 Million in Two Months Due to Coronavirus (https://variety.com/2020/film/asia/china-box-office-coronavirus-1203520600/)
By VIVIENNE CHOW

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/china-cinema-closed.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1

View of a closed cinema after the Chinese government discouraged public gatherings due to a virus outbreak, in Beijing, China, 27 January 2020. China warned that the coronavirus outbreak is accelerating further, deepening fears about an epidemic that has affected more than 2,700 people worldwide and killed at least 80 people in the country.China coronavirus outbreak accelerating further, Beijing - 27 Jan 2020
CREDIT: WU HONG/EPA-EFE/SHUTTERSTOCK
China’s box office might have lost as much as RMB 1.5 billion ($214 million) in the first two months of this year due to the coronavirus outbreak, but a nationwide resumption of movie theaters and production is unlikely to happen any time soon.

“Judging from the current situation, the film industry is not equipped to resume business yet, and we have not approved industry’s demands to resume business as of now,” said Chen Bei, deputy secretary general of the Beijing municipal government.

Local data company Ent Group has estimated that box-office receipts in January and February have totaled only RMB 220 million ($31.3 million), compared to RMB 1.45 billion ($217 million) in the same period in 2019 and RMB 1.51 billion ($241.6 million) in 2018.

Ent Group estimated the decline in box office could be as high as RMB 1.5 billion ($214 million) due to the fact that the Lunar New Year holiday season started on Jan. 25, much earlier compared with the usual beginning of or mid-February. “An early holiday season should’ve given more time for the box office to grow,” the report said.

But cinemas were forced to shut down just before the Lunar New Year holiday and Wuhan and other cities in Hubei province were locked down on Jan. 23.

The estimated figures came after the release of a joint directive from Beijing Center for Diseases Prevention and Control, and Beijing Municipal Film Bureau on Feb. 26, which stipulates strict guidelines for cinema operators and film crews if they wish to resume business.

Cinema operators must seek approval from the authorities to re-open movie theaters and adopt stringent measures such as selling tickets on alternate rows, requiring movie-goers to register with their real names and personal details, and auditoriums to be thoroughly disinfected after each screening.

Film crews with less than 50 people can resume filming in Beijing if they are approved, but only if their body temperature does not exceed 37.3 degree celsius. All film crew members must wear masks throughout the production, except for performers.

But film crews with more than 50 people will not be allowed to resume filming in Beijing until the plague is gone. Crew members travelling from affected areas such as Hubei province are not allowed to take part in any production in the city.

Ent Group added in the report that cinemas in China are not likely to re-open in March. As of March 2, Covid-19 has already infected more than 80,000 in mainland China and killed 2,914 people.

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[GeneChing]

NEWS FEBRUARY 28, 2020 6:15AM PT
Hollywood Studios Assembling Coronavirus Strategy Teams (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/hollywood-coronavirus-no-time-to-die-mulan-1203518001/)
By BRENT LANG
Executive Editor of Film and Media
@https://twitter.com/BrentALang

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/b25_25594_r-e1575469208183.jpg?w=1000&h=562&crop=1.
CREDIT: NICOLE DOVE

As coronavirus continues its deadly march across the globe, the outbreak is wreaking havoc with Hollywood’s efforts to launch major movies and shows. In the process, companies are asking employees to delay work trips to countries such as China, Japan, Italy and South Korea, the regions that have been the most affected by the disease, and they are scuttling promotional campaigns for several upcoming blockbusters.

Studios have already cancelled plans for China premieres for films such as Disney’s “Mulan” and the James Bond adventure “No Time to Die” — moves that could cost those movies tens of millions in box office revenue. Sony’s “Bloodsport” was also expected to screen in China, but that release date remains up in the air. Most of these films hadn’t gotten the official word from Chinese authorities that they would be allowed to screen in the country, but there’s little chance that will come any time soon, as movie theaters in China remain closed. There are also indications that several upcoming movies such as “Mulan,” “The Grudge,” and “Onward” will delay their release in Italy, where the number of cases recently jumped to 400. No major U.S. films will debut in the country this weekend. Globally, the disease, named COVID-19, has infected over 82,500 people and killed 2,810. Healthcare experts expect that number to climb as coronavirus continues to spread to other parts of the world.

No studios were willing to go on the record about their response to the crisis, but privately they said they were taking “a wait-and-see” approach as the number of hotspots expands. Many are in regular contact with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the World Health Organization as they assess the rapidly changing situation.

Most of the major studios have begun assembling advisory teams comprising members of their production, marketing, finance, and human resources staff to assess the potential impact of the disease. Part of their task is to figure out how staff in these affected areas can remain safe. In some cases, they’re encouraging people in areas where there are a growing number of cases to work from home, and helping to ensure the technology is in place to make that happen.

Another topic of discussion is the business ramifications of a health crisis that has the potential to grow into an epidemic or pandemic. Studios are trying to determine if they should move major releases to avoid debuting films in parts of the world where coronavirus is spreading. At the same time, they’re assessing what impact such moves will have on other movies that are scheduled to debut later in 2020 and 2021. Studio executives believe that the theater closures in China and Italy, as well as the spread of the disease in major markets such as South Korea could result in billions of dollars in lost ticket sales.

“Mulan,” a $200 million adventure film with a cast of Asian actors, was expected to resonate in markets such as China, where it may not play for weeks or months. Rival studios say they are watching to see how Disney handles the challenges of debuting the film at a time when theaters in some countries are closed and people are hesitant to spend time in public spaces, before determining what to do with their own upcoming releases. The Bond film, “Wonder Woman: 1984,” and the ninth “Fast & Furious” movie are among the major films debuting in the coming months that had planned robust international rollouts. Those could be impacted if the disease continues to spread. The latest 007 adventure had originally intended to take a promotional swing through China, South Korea, and Japan, but those plans have been abandoned.

So far, studios such as Warner Bros., Paramount, Universal, and Disney are also still expected to attend CinemaCon along with the stars of their upcoming movies. The annual exhibition industry trade show is being held in Las Vegas at the end of March and brings attendees from across the globe — though Chinese companies have cancelled on account of the travel ban. In a note to participants this week, Mitch Neuhauser, managing director of CinemaCon, and John Fithian, head of the National Association of Theatre Owners, the group behind the convention, said they still expected the event to be well-attended.

“An encouraging measure of the impact of coronavirus is that the number of concerned emails or phone calls coming to us are minimal,” they wrote. “We are, though, inundated with our normal number of emails and calls that are all about the planning of the convention.”

Justin Kroll contributed to this report.

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[GeneChing]

Entertainment giants brace for outsize hit from theme park closures, cinema shutdowns (https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/entertainment-giants-brace-outsize-hit-theme-park-closures-cinema-shutdowns-n1147506)
"China alone is a third of the world’s movie screens. I can’t think of anything comparable," said one entertainment expert about the financial impact of cinemas across China remaining shuttered.

https://media2.s-nbcnews.com/j/newscms/2020_10/3252246/200302-shanghai-disney-ew-550p_6d83d1f27be6bb5b0f9e971ef96725ea.fit-2000w.jpg
A security guard wearing a protective facemask is seen at the temporarily closed Shanghai Disney resort in Shanghai on Feb. 23, 2020.Noel Celis / AFP - Getty Images file
March 3, 2020, 6:02 AM PST
By Claire Atkinson

Major entertainment and media conglomerates have been grappling with the unstoppable coronavirus contagion in Asia and Europe, and now it’s arrived on American shores.

COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, has already claimed six lives in the United States, with almost 100 confirmed cases nationwide, making some Americans cautious about spending time in public spaces.

"This virus has so many unknowns and is clearly highly contagious. Why take the risk, being in huge public places like theme parks or contained on a cruise ship?” Stacey Bendet, chief executive of Alice+Olivia fashion company, told NBC News.

Shares of some entertainment stocks fell on Monday, with Live Nation, SeaWorld Entertainment and Six Flags showing declines for the day. Disney and Netflix stocks rose — along with fitness company Peloton — as interest in "at-home" entertainment gathers strength.

“If [the virus] is a major issue in the U.S. into the May/June time frame, all bets are off," said James Hardiman, a managing director at Wedbush Securities. "I wouldn’t think we are there yet,” he said, noting that the big regional parks aren’t yet open for the season.

China has not been so lucky. Shanghai's $5.5 billion Disney Resort and Hong Kong Disneyland both closed indefinitely on Jan. 26, which Disney said would ding its bottom line by $175 million. In Japan, the two Disney-branded theme parks in Tokyo are closed until March 16 as a precaution against the spread of the coronavirus.

"The precise magnitude of the financial impact is highly dependent on the duration of the closures," Disney's Chief Financial Officer Christine McCarthy said last month.

Universal's Osaka theme park has also closed down for two weeks as part of the government mandate. Universal Beijing Resort, a giant theme park under construction and penciled for a spring opening, has emergency staff back on the job. They are being monitored with thermal equipment and some have been encouraged to work at home, according to a spokesperson for the company. Universal is owned by Comcast, the parent company of NBC News.

Television show production has also been hurt. CBS said on Friday it would postpone filming on its global adventure TV series, “The Amazing Race,” citing "increased concerns and uncertainty regarding the coronavirus around the world."

Film producers have been left in limbo. “This has thrown a wrench into filming schedules,” said Rob Cain, a partner in Pacific Bridge Picture, which works closely with Chinese companies. Cain said it was unclear how insurance policies would deal with the problem, given all the lost revenue.

China began closing some 70,000 movie theaters on Jan. 23, with no word on when they might open again.

"China alone is a third of the world’s movie screens,” Cain said. “I can’t think of anything comparable, and I’ve been in the business 30 years."

Global box office revenue clocked in at $42.5 billion in 2019, with China representing $9.2 billion.

“It is an enormous impact,” said Stanley Rosen, an expert in U.S.-China relations and a professor of political science at the University of Southern California. He pointed to the potentially delayed release of Disney’s $200 million Chinese warrior movie “Mulan” in the China market, which is slated to open in late March globally.

In Europe, AMC Theatres closed its cinemas in Northern Italy to help local governments contain the spread of the disease. Half of all Italian cinemas are now closed, according to the Hollywood Reporter. The Cannes Film Festival said it was monitoring the epidemic, but would move ahead with its May event, even though a Cannes resident tested positive for the virus.


Claire Atkinson
Claire Atkinson is the senior media editor for NBC News.

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[GeneChing]

MARCH 15, 2020 11:04PM PT
China’s Economy Heading for Historic Reverse, Reflecting Virus Impact (https://variety.com/2020/biz/asia/china-economy-historic-reverse-virus-impact-1203535186/)
By PATRICK FRATER
Asia Bureau Chief

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2017/10/china-money.jpg?w=700&h=393&crop=1
CREDIT: REX/SHUTTERSTOCK

An historic shift into reverse gear for the Chinese economy could be one of the next consequences flowing from the spread of the novel coronavirus. That prospect threw Asian stock markets into reverse on Monday, despite economic stimulus measures in the U.S.

The U.S. Federal Reserve, on Sunday (Monday morning in Asia) announced a full percentage point cut in its benchmark interest rate, reducing it to close to zero. The Fed also promised to inject liquidity into the economic system by buying at least $500 billion of Treasury securities and at least $200 billion of mortgage-backed securities. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority followed the U.S. central bank’s example and cut its own base rates.

But financial markets were unimpressed. Australia’s ASX index crashed by more than 9% on Monday to 5,002. New Zealand’s NZX 50 index fell 3.6%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index, already a bear market since Friday, was down 2.2% at the lunchtime trading break. South Korea’s KOSPI index headed for a loss of more than 1%, though Japan’s Nikkei index rose 0.7%, apparently in anticipation of stimulus measures.


Mainland Chinese markets were firmly down, with the SSE Shanghai Composite benchmark down more than 2%.

Chinese data unveiled on Monday showed that industrial production in the world’s manufacturing hub fell by 13.3% in January and February. That has never happened before in the modern era.

Other data showed Chinese retail sales down by 20.5% in the same two months, and fixed asset investment down by 24.5%.

Despite China, now seeming to get back to work after new Covid-19 infections have peaked in the country, many economists are now forecasting an historic decline in China’s GDP when data for the January-March quarter is completed.

In total, China has incurred some 81,000 coronavirus infections and over 3,100 deaths. On Monday, it reported 16 new coronavirus infections and 14 deaths, numbers that are significantly down on the past trend. Since the weekend, mainland authorities have been saying that most new cases are not local infections, but are imported with foreigners arriving in China.

That pattern may also explain the latest fall in Asian stock markets. The recent decision by Apple to close its retail stores outside Greater China hurt many of its Asian suppliers. iPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision fell 4.3% to TWD71.3 per share by mid-Monday. Sunny Optical slumped 10.6% to HK$105.9. LG Display was 2.2% lower at KRW11,050. Sharp bucked the trend with a 2.2% gain to JPY989.

The pain being incurred by Chinese businesses was reflected in additional share price losses for Alibaba and Tencent. The Hong Kong-traded units of Alibaba dropped 5% on Monday to HK$182.10, while Tencent fell 4.2% to HK$349.60.

There was no new bad news for China’s media sector. But the longer that mainland cinemas stay shut, the deeper the problems become for companies including: Wanda Film (whose shares were down 4.4% to CNY17.12); China Film Co. (down 2.4% to CNY12.96); and Huayi Brothers (down 3.5% to CNY3.77). Hong Kong-traded Imax China on Monday fell 3.5% to HK$13.94.

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Hong Kong Filmmakers Discuss the Dire State of the HK Film Industry (https://www.jaynestars.com/news/hong-kong-filmmakers-discuss-the-dire-state-of-the-hk-film-industry/)
By addy on May 31, 2020 in Movies, NEWS

https://www.jaynestars.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/hong-kong-filmmakers.jpg

The COVID-19 pandemic has made the already cold Hong Kong film industry even colder. For nearly twenty years, HK movies were the fire of Asian cinema, dominating the eastern sphere. HK films pioneered Chinese cinema, and the Chinese diaspora carried these films wherever they went. There wasn’t a single country in the world where they weren’t exposed to HK’s legacy.
But the HK film industry—overwhelmed by its much larger Asian neighbors—has been on a downward spiral since the late 90’s. HK films are no longer as influential as they were thirty years ago. Some even say that HK films have already completed its mission, and has passed down the baton to their neighbors.

Hong Kong’s four great filmmakers—Derek Yee (爾冬陞), Henry Fong (方平), Ronald Wong (黃斌), and Cheang Pou-soi (鄭保瑞) all came together to discuss about the future of Hong Kong’s film industry. From the problems the industry are facing today, to the possibility of having a great revival, here are their thoughts.
The HK People Can No Longer Relate to Their Films
The failure of catching up to the times, the “ingenuity” of its stories, the shrinking of its market, and the lack of relatability in co-produced films have led many to claim that HK films are already dead. Over the past decade, more and more HK films have become co-productions with other industries, specifically with the much larger mainland Chinese film market.

“Hong Kong viewers aren’t exactly satisfied with co-produced films [with China],” said Derek Yee (The Shinjuku Incident, The Great Magician). “A lot of these films are tied by regulations. You can’t do movies that are about triads, that are violent, or too erotic. That’s why, eventually, these co-produced films drove Hong Kong viewers further and further away from them. At this rate, you basically can’t turn back.”
In a previous interview, Cheang Pou-soi (The Monkey King, SPL 2) said that Hong Kong films were the first to give up on their audiences. Yee agreed with his statement. “It’s true. When we made these films, we didn’t consider the Hong Kong viewers. That’s why they’ve given up on us. We also have so many options to choose from. We’re not limited to consuming just one market. Take Korean films for example. They’re very versatile. Even films in Japan and Taiwan have looser restrictions.”
The HK industry’s biggest flaw is its failure to capture the interest of its main market. HK people stopped consuming their films because they did not find them worthy to watch anymore. Because of this, many film investors have started to look elsewhere, specifically the much larger mainland market. This has, overtime, pushed back the HK film industry even further.

Can Pure HK Films Still Survive?

But if Hong Kongers don’t enjoy co-productions, would they be interested in watching a pure local film again? Will the HK industry be revived with more local productions?
“Let’s not talk about the mainland and Taiwan,” said Henry Fong (Forsaken Cop). “Because they are now in a more advanced position. Our films used to be very popular in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, England, the Netherlands, and North America. If we just work on doing local films, would we be able to survive?”
Yee did not have a very optimistic answer. “If I was the investor? If you give me 1 million Hong Kong dollars to do a movie that won’t be sold overseas, then you are crazy. With that HK$1 million, HK$300,000 of that would go into marketing, and then you’ll be left with nothing to use. By then, you’ll have to ask the media to help out.”
He added another example: “Let’s say the movie’s budget is HK$1.3 million. To earn a profit, that film would have to gross as least three times its budget, equating to HK$3.9 million. Including marketing, office rentals, and other admin fees, that just wouldn’t be enough. You’re still losing money.”
The lack of funds, the small market, and the lack of interest among the HK public to support local films have been pushing the industry to a dead end for years, long before the current pandemic.
Movies are a form of commercial art. To make a good film requires a decent amount of funding and creativity. “Take going to a restaurant for example,” said Fong. “Usually you eat first before you pay, but when you’re making a movie, you’re paying first before you eat. You don’t even know what you’re going to eat yet. It’s a huge gamble.”

Derek Yee Tells Louis Koo: “Watch Out for Your Wallet”

A few years ago, just as the industry was in deep discussions about its dire condition, Louis Koo (古天樂) splurged out the money to create his own film production studio in hopes to revive the HK film industry. Yee found his attempts to be bittersweet.
“I told him to watch out for his wallet,” said Yee. “But he’s saved a lot of money, and I am not the person to hold back someone who is so hot-blooded and passionate for the industry. All I can do is offer him my care.”
Actor-producer Ronald Wong said, “He is worthy to support.” Yee added, “I believe in karma. A good heart will be rewarded.”

Will There Be More Cop Films in the Future?

The Hong Kong action and crime genre was what made HK films known in the world. However, recent political and societal struggles have made the topic sensitive.
“It’s hard to say what will happen,” said Yee. “This is still ongoing, and hasn’t quite made history yet.”
In 2004’s One Nite in Mongkok <旺角黑夜> directed by Yee, there was a scene featuring a cop beating up a person. In the 2007 film Protégé <門徒>, Daniel Wu (吳彥祖) was brutally attacked by customs officers after he was arrested. How would these scenes carry over if they had occurred in films made today?
While these questions are difficult to answer, they are important to consider. Though the crime genre is very sensitive to pursue during this time, Cheang said the Hong Kong people are exceptionally well at adapting. It is not in their nature to keep silent, and he believes that filmmakers and other artistes will come up with their own creative ways to share their vision.
Source: HK01.com

Nothing like a good HK cop drama.

[GeneChing]

Bona Film Group Executive Dies by Apparent Suicide at 52 (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/bona-film-group-executive-dead-by-apparent-suicide-at-52-1297816)
5:13 AM PDT 6/10/2020 by Patrick Brzeski

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2016/11/beijing_skyline.jpg
Getty Images
Beijing

Bona released a statement over social media saying that Huang Wei, a vice president at the company who oversaw its cinema division, had died, but provided no details.
Shock waves of sorrow ripped through the Chinese film industry on Wednesday as news spread that Huang Wei, an influential and widely liked senior executive at Bona Film Group, leapt to his death from an 18th floor window at the company’s headquarters in central Beijing.
Bona released a statement over social media late Wednesday saying that Huang, a vice president at the company who oversaw its cinema division, had died at the age of 52. No other details were included.
Sources close to Bona tell The Hollywood Reporter that it is believed Huang jumped from an office window late Wednesday morning. The incident occurred at Bona’s corporate headquarters in the U-Center Building, a mixed-use commercial building in Beijing’s Chaoyang district.
Bona is among China’s top-tier of film and media companies. The company produced or co-produced three of China’s 10 highest-grossing films of 2019, including The Captain ($410 million) and The Bravest ($237 million). The company also co-financed Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
Huang joined Bona in 2009 from rival cinema circuit Stellar Cinemas. He was influential in Bona’s growth as a movie theater operator. The company now has approximately 80 cinemas in China.
News of his death — and its suspected cause — circulated rapidly through the Beijing film business over social media.
Leading Chinese auteur Jia Zhangke shared Bona’s statement on Weibo, writing simply, "Film industry grief." Jerry Ye, former president at Chinese studio Huayi Brothers Media, one of Bona’s biggest rivals, also posted just one word: "grief." Many others shared emojis of a single candle burning.
Jimmy Wu, CEO of Chinese cinema chain Lumiere Pavilions, posted at length about Huang’s death, writing: "It's so sudden! ... On April 16th, we talked for more than half an hour! The call was mainly about the future of the cinema. He was a little depressed about the late opening of the cinema, and I talked a lot about the bright future of Chinese movies. ... I didn't expect to say good-bye after this conversation. Alas, I can not say a word. I sincerely hope that the relevant parties can let the movie theaters get back to work, so that staff can maintain a livelihood, in order to comfort Huang Wei's spirit in heaven!"




Threads
Chollywood Rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
OUAT...IH (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70864-Once-Upon-a-Time-in-Hollywood)

[GeneChing]

CORONAVIRUS
China’s Darkened Movie Theaters Pose a Danger to Hollywood (https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2020/06/china-theaters-box-office-hollywood-movies)
Billions are at stake as the world’s second-biggest box office market keeps cinemas closed during its halting recovery from COVID-19.
BY ANTHONY BREZNICAN
JUNE 19, 2020

https://media.vanityfair.com/photos/5eebdcd19d368940b137b343/master/w_2560%2Cc_limit/movies-theater-closed-china.jpg
FROM STR/AFP/GETTY IMAGES.

Even as China gradually gets back on its feet from the devastation of its COVID-19 outbreak and quarantine earlier this year, its roughly 70,000 movie theaters remain dark, one aspect of everyday life that remains locked down by the government.

President Xi Jinping has indicated no rush to reopen the nation’s cinemas, cutting off the world’s second-largest market, which was close to usurping the United States as number one. China’s strict cultural ministry only allows a limited number of international films into the country, and Hollywood has often tried to break through by tailoring scripts to remove elements undesirable to censors or adding scenes with popular Chinese stars.

The enduring lockdown on Chinese theaters was chronicled by the New York Times in a recent article, which stated that it was one factor “holding back the Chinese economy when the world needs it most.” The article noted that even though theaters for plays and concerts had reopened, Xi had continued to keep cinemas shuttered. “If anyone wants to watch a movie, just watch it online,” Xi said during a public appearance on March 31.

But what are the actual losses for both Hollywood and other filmmakers around the globe? The answer, in a word: massive.

China’s total contribution to the global box office in 2019 was $9.2 billion. The North American tally was $11.4 billion. Together they made up nearly half of the world’s total movie ticket sales of $42.5 billion.

“China can often save a movie,” said Paul Dergarabedian, a box office analyst with the media-metrics tracker Comscore. He cited Terminator Genisys and the two Pacific Rim movies as titles that benefited from being Chinese hits. “Some of those films that didn’t do well in North America did do well internationally, particularly in China.”

He called China “the savior of many a would-be blockbuster that, had they relied merely on their North American box office, would have remained really in the red.”

If the country’s theaters remain closed indefinitely, the lost revenue could be catastrophic. That’s more than Hollywood studios can reckon with at the moment, as the effort continues to both restart production of new films and get North American theaters operational again. Studio executives don’t know when that will happen, even as they barrel toward the late-July releases of would-be blockbusters like Christopher Nolan’s Tenet.

This adds another layer to the already-complicated relationship between studios and China’s State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television, which typically allows fewer than 40 international films to screen per year. In addition, China enforces periodic “blackouts” when no new international films can screen publicly.

If China’s leadership wants to hold back the reopening of movie theaters, pressuring them to do otherwise could backfire, making a bad situation worse.

Comscore’s total $9.2 billion number for China’s 2019 box office only tells part of the story. Of that number, about $2.9 billion went to Hollywood films. In 2018, the country’s total box office was about $8.8 billion, and $3.2 billion was for Hollywood films. In 2017, the total was $8.3 billion, while approximately $3.4 billion went to American studios.

That means that even as China’s box office prowess has increased, the share of money going to Hollywood has slightly diminished. Will the prolonged shutdown of theaters accelerate that decline, or will Chinese moviegoers be so hungry for cinematic escape that the box office comes roaring back?

As per usual in Hollywood, the answer is the old maxim: Nobody knows anything. Except that there’s a lot of money to be found in China, for those who can collect it.

At first, I thought Covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia) would put a damper of Chollywood Rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising). Now I'm beginning to wonder if they will emerge the victor.

[GeneChing]

BUSINESS
China's Wanda Film Warns of $226M Loss After 6 Months of Cinema Shutdowns (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/wanda-film-warns-226m-loss-6-months-cinema-shutdowns-1303265)
6:51 PM PDT 7/14/2020 by Patrick Brzeski

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2016/06/wanda.jpg
Getty Images
A Wanda cinema in China

China's largest cinema operator, which also controls North America's largest chain AMC Theatres, has seen all of its Asian theaters idle since Jan. 25, months before movie theater shutdowns hit the U.S.

China's largest cinema chain operator Wanda Film said it expects to lose $214 to $228 million (RMB 1.5 to 1.6 billion) in the first half of 2020 thanks to over five months on continual cinema shutdowns in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

The decline represents a stark reversal of fortunes from the $75 million profit the Chinese exhibition giant reported during the same period in 2019. "Operating income dropped by a big margin compared with the same period last year," the company said in a statement, noting its ongoing rent and salary obligations.

Movie theaters across China shut down en masse on Jan. 23, shortly before the weeklong Lunar Near Year holiday, always the country's biggest box office stretch of the year. Wanda's production and distribution business also are hurting amid the pandemic. The studio's latest tentpole Detective Chinatown 3, the latest installment in a series that has grossed nearly $700 million, was set to be released over the holiday but remains on the shelf. Production of other projects has been indefinitely delayed.

Total box office in China for the first half of 2020 was $311 million (RMB 2.2 billion), down 93 percent from $4.4 billion (RMB 31.2 billion) during the same period last year, according to data from Artisan Gateway.

Although China has made great strides in controlling the coronavirus, cinema operators have suffered repeated setbacks in their attempts to resume business over the past several months.

In mid-March, Beijing regulators appeared to have settled on a province-by-province phased reopening strategy, giving approximately 600 cinemas in the least COVID-19-affected regions of the country the green light to reopen. Within days, however, they were ordered reshuttered, reportedly at the direction of senior central government authorities who were concerned about the prospect of a second outbreak. The industry went back into waiting.

In early May, reopening again appeared imminent. China’s top administrative body, the State Council, publicly stated on May 8 that indoor entertainment facilities, including cinemas and live music venues, could resume business nationwide. Yet no instructions for precisely when and how the reopening should be undertaken were ever provided, keeping theater operators in limbo, awaiting further guidance from officialdom. Then, on June 11, Beijing discovered a fresh cluster of locally transmitted COVID-19 infections at a food processing facility, prompting the city's health authorities to again order cinemas to remain shut.

Rumors circulated through Beijing industry circles earlier this month that the reboot was finally coming in late July, but an official plan, or confirmation, has been unforthcoming.

Wanda also is the largest shareholder in North American cinema chain AMC Theatres — the Chinese company owns 49.85 percent of AMC's outstanding common stock, but holds 74.89 percent of the combined voting power — but Tuesday's earnings warning made no mention of the group's North American holdings. AMC is held by a division of the Dalian Wanda Group parent company, not the Wanda Film subsidiary, which is listed on the Shenzhen stock exchange.

Threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

Jul 15, 2020 10:18pm PT
China to Begin Reopening Cinemas
By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/06/china-cinema-spirited-away-shutterstock_editorial_10322704e-res.jpg?w=600
ROMAN PILIPEY/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

China will begin reopening cinemas in “low-risk regions” from July 20, the China Film Administration (CFA) announced Thursday, ending nearly six months of closures that left thousands of theaters bankrupt.

“Cinemas in low-risk regions can resume business in an orderly manner on July 20, with the effective implementation of prevention and control measures. Mid- and high-risk regions must temporarily remain closed,” the administration said in a statement posted to its official website.

“Once low-risk regions become designated as mid- or high-risk regions, they must strictly implement epidemic prevention and control measures…[and] cinemas must close again in a timely fashion in accordance with requirements.”

The long-awaited green light comes, however, with caveats that may mean that profits continue to prove elusive for the hard-hit Chinese exhibition sector.

Attendance of each screening will be capped at 30%, the CFA said in a four-page document of specific guidelines and safety measures, and the overall number of screenings per venue must be reduced to “half their number in a normal period.” Furthermore, each film screening may not exceed two hours in length, it said — without providing further detail as to what this might mean for longer films.

Meanwhile, concessions — cinemas’ biggest profit driver — will be banned.

“Film screening venues will not sell snacks and beverages, and eating and drinking in the screening rooms is prohibited,” it said.

Other indoor businesses such as restaurants or transportation resumed operations months ago in China, and currently do not face policy restrictions on their operating capacity.

The CFA said that cinemas will be required to follow the “precise and scientific implementation of prevention and control measures.”

All tickets must now be sold virtually through real-name registered online reservations, and procured via contactless methods, it said. Different parties unknown to each other should be sold seats more than a meter apart.

Public areas like lobbies, corridors and bathrooms should be disinfected no less than twice a day, while commonly touched areas like ticket vending machines, sales counters and public seats should be wiped down no less than five times a day. Armrests, 3D classes and other such frequently touched items should be disinfected after each use. Ventilation in screening halls must be improved.

Masks will be mandatory for both employees and customers, with temperatures taken for anyone entering the venue.

Employees returning to work from mid- and high-risk regions will be asked to quarantine, and to “reduce unnecessary going out and avoid frequenting crowded places.”

The CFA also described the precise bureaucratic mechanism by which reopenings will be monitored.

“Once each region’s local film department has received the local party committee and government’s approval for their plan to reopen cinemas, they should discuss with the local CDC how to reopen in accordance with the rules,” it explained. Ultimately, different regions’ plans for re-opening must be reported back up to the national-level CFA.

Unverified leaked documents and statements from insiders indicate that cinemas in Guangzhou, one of China’s top movie-going regions, may be among the first batch to reopen.

The problem now facing cinemas is what they will have to show viewers, when.

When a small portion of cinemas reopened briefly in March, business was dismal. Venues were unable to attract much of a crowd by offering stale local titles that most people had already seen. Fresh content will now be crucial to getting people through the door.

The first film to confirm its intentions to release theatrically in China was “The First Farewell,” a Xinjiang-set about three Uighur children which Variety called “an outstanding debut feature” from writer-director Wang Lina. Even before authorities had mentioned any timeline for reopening cinemas, the movie said earlier this month that it was “scheduled to screen the first day cinemas reopen.” It issued a new tagline aligned with its tale of sorrowful partings: “Let’s meet again after a long period of separation.”

Previously, a number of Hollywood films were set to hit Chinese cinemas to reel in post-COVID crowds. They included a 3D, 4K restoration of “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” as well as “1917” and “Little Women,” which both began putting out new promotional material in May, apparently in anticipation of a theatrical run. All four films of the “Avengers” series, “Coco,” “Call of the Wild,” Oscar winner “Jojo Rabbit,” “Inception,” “Avatar” and “Interstellar” are other Western movies whose names have appeared as potential kickstarters for the Chinese box office.

Others like “Ford v. Ferrari,” “Sonic the Hedgehog,” and “Bad Boys for Life” are also already sitting in the holding tank, having been approved for earlier, cancelled Chinese theatrical releases.

Yet just because the doors are open doesn’t mean that the profits will flow. Confidence in a quick rebound at the box office appears in some quarters, at least, to be low.

On Wednesday, the $43 million-budgeted, effects-laden Chinese fantasy actioner “Double World” announced that it would forgo a theatrical debut in favor of premiering online on iQiyi and Netflix, where it will debut next weekend. The decision at least “provides us with a way to reach users and recoup our investment,” its producer Zhang Amu said.

threads
Chollywood Rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

Jul 17, 2020 9:45am PT
‘Pursuit of Happyness,’ ‘Dolittle,’ ‘Bloodshot,’ And ‘Coco’ Set to Open China Cinemas (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/pursuit-of-happyness-dolittle-bloodshot-china-cinemas-reopening-1234709488/)

By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/bloodshot-movie-vin-diesel.jpg?w=600
Bloodshot Movie Vin Diesel
Courtesy of Sony

Chinese cinemas will open next week in regions at low risk for COVID-19 with a boost from a slew of Hollywood titles, including “The Pursuit of Happyness,” “Dolittle,” “Bloodshot,” and “Coco.”

China’s theaters have been closed for longer than any other country’s, having stayed dark — despite a brief attempt to reopen in March — since the lunar new year holiday in late January.

As of early Saturday morning in China, 22 films are set to hit theaters on Monday, the first day of reopenings, including U.S. films “Pursuit of Happyness,” “Coco,” and “A Dog’s Purpose.”

The others are all Chinese re-run titles, except for one new one: “A First Farewell,” a well-received arthouse title set in China’s Xinjiang region that screened as part of last year’s Generation Kplus selection at Berlin.

The opening day offerings include: blockbusters “Wolf Warrior 2,” “Monster Hunt,” “Wolf Totem,” “American Dreams in China,” and Jackie Chan’s “CZ12”; comedies “The Mermaid” and “Goodbye Mr. Loser”; thrillers “Sheep Without A Shepherd” and Huayi Brothers’ 2009 “The Message”; rom-coms “How Long Will I Love You” and “Beijing Love Story”; propaganda film “The Moment of the Sunrise”; and animations “Big Fish and Begonia,” “White Snake,” “Nezha,” “The Adventure of Afanti,” and the classic 1960s version of the “Journey to the West” tale, “The Monkey King (Uproar in Heaven),” a nostalgic audience favorite.

“Happyness,” the 2006 biographical drama starring Will Smith, appears to have had a short run in China back in 2008, grossing just $848,000. Chinese audiences typically gravitate towards emotional but ultimately feel-good titles, so distributors are likely hoping it will tap into viewers who recently enjoyed Oscar-winning “Green Book” enough to shoot it to a gross $71 million in China last year — just a few million shy of its $85 million U.S. run.

“Coco” did extremely well in China, despite featuring ghosts, which the country’s censorship regime technically bans. It grossed $189 million in 2017.

Meanwhile, four foreign films are set to debut July 24, kicking off cinemas’ first opening weekend back in business. They are: “Dolittle,” “Bloodshot,” “Capernaum,” and “A Dog’s Journey,” the Dennis Quaid-starring sequel to “A Dog’s Purpose.”

Universal’s “Dolittle” was supposed to screen Feb. 21 in China, but was indefinitely pushed back due to COVID-19 as cinemas shut. Its star Robert Downey Jr. is beloved to Chinese fans for playing Tony Stark in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Superhero film “Bloodshot” was released March 13 stateside. Its China release could give it a shot at profitability, given that headliner Vin Diesel has a large fan base there thanks to his “Fast & Furious” franchise appearances. Made on a reported $45 million budget, the title grossed just $29 million globally, $10 million of which was earned in the U.S.

“Capernaum” already became a surprise theatrical hit last year in China, grossing $54 million last April, a sum greater than its haul anywhere else in the world.

Variety has seen a leaked list of titles that state-run distributor China Film Group has sent out to cinemas but was unable to verify its origins. It said that in addition to the films listed above that have already confirmed, the first two “Avengers” series films (2012’s “The Avengers” and 2015’s “Avengers: Age of Ultron”), James Cameron’s classic “Titanic,” and local sci-fi mega-hit “The Wandering Earth” will be re-released but have yet to set dates.

The document indicated that nearly all the Chinese re-releases would screen via a “charity” model in which distributors and producers will forgo their cut of box office returns in favor of handing it over to help struggling exhibitors. “Capernaum,” whose China rights are held by Road Pictures, will also be released under this model, but not the other foreign films .

Meanwhile, the well-anticipated local animated film “Mr. Miao” has confirmed it will release on July 31.

What an odd selection of films. Man, I miss going out to the movies...:(

threads
Chollywood Rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

Wonder what the U.S. IMAX loss might be...



Jul 22, 2020 6:57pm PT
Imax China Warns of $36 Million Half Year Loss (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/imax-china-losses-wanda-film-coronavirus-1234714006/)
By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2018/04/imax-logo.jpg?w=600
Courtesy of IMAX

Imax China, the Hong Kong-listed subsidiary of Imax, has warned that it expects a net loss between $34 and $36 million for the first half of the year, as cinema closures in the country due to COVID-19 have slammed exhibition firms.

The 2020 figures stand in contrast to a net profit of $24 million in the same period last year.

There are around 700 Imax cinemas in mainland China, nearly all of which have been shut since late January because of the coronavirus.

A notice posted Tuesday to the Hong Kong stock exchange said the 2020 decrease was primarily attributable to the shutdown and coronavirus slowing the installation of new theater systems. A non-recurring deferred income tax charge and provisions of around $9 million made for trade and financing receivables were also other factors.

The news comes after China’s largest cinema chain operator Wanda Film said last week that it anticipates net losses of between $214 and $228 million in the first half of the year, down from net profits of $75 million (RMB524 million) during the same period last year. Its 600 complexes have also been shut for nearly that entire time, and its blockbuster “Detective Chinatown 3” indefinitely postponed its late January premiere.

Despite the downturn, Wanda and Imax struck a 20-theater agreement earlier this month, in which Wanda will upgrade ten of its existing theaters to the latest “Imax with Laser” technology and install Imax systems at ten others. With these upcoming systems, there will be 378 Imax screens across China at Wanda venues.

Wanda Film’s executive president said that Imax “will be critical in welcoming back to theaters and offering the best possible cinematic experience well into the future.”

Last year, Imax saw a record-breaking year in China with a box office of $366 million. It may be quite some time before the company sees such highs again.

Although cinemas began reopening from Monday, the Chinese box office has so far been slow, with theaters earning just $500,000 nationwide their first day back in business. The strong $20.8 million opening weekend of South Korean zombie film “Peninsula” elsewhere in Asia, however, provides some hope of a faster recovery once desirable new blockbusters start hitting screens with regularity again.


threads
Chollywood Rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

I can hardly wait for US theaters to reopen.



Jul 26, 2020 11:25am PT
China’s First Post-Coronavirus Weekend Box Office Led by ‘Dolittle,’ ‘Bloodshot’ (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/china-box-office-coronavirus-dolittle-bloodsho-1234716819/)
By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/01/dolittle-2.jpg?w=600
(from left) Gorilla Chee-Chee (Rami Malek)
Universal Pictures

Robert Downey Jr.’s family film “Dolittle” and Sony’s thriller “Bloodshot” led China’s first opening weekend at the box office since the coronavirus outbreak, a sign that new titles sell better than re-runs of beloved classics. Five out of the top 10 films this weekend were Hollywood titles.

China began reopening theaters in regions deemed at low risk for COVID-19 on Monday. As of noon on Sunday, local time, it had opened around 4,900 cinemas, accounting for approximately 44% of the country’s total. They are currently only allowed to operate at 30% capacity to provide sufficient social distancing between customers.

“Dolittle,” from Universal, was the top title this weekend with a $4.71 million three-day debut, according to Chinese data provider Ent Group. Vin Diesel-starring “Bloodshot,” backed by China’s Bona Film Group, trailed in second place, bowing to the tune of $2.61 million.

Local crime thriller “Sheep Without a Shepherd” came in third with $2 million. This is the third theatrical outing for the Chinese adaptation of the 2013 Indian film “Drishyam,” after it premiered last December and hit screens again briefly in March.

In fourth and fifth slots were re-releases of the family-friendly Disney animations, “Coco” and “Zootopia,” which grossed $740,000 and $290,000, respectively. The 2006 Will Smith-starring title “The Pursuit of Happyiness” came in sixth with $220,000 in ticket sales.

A hodge podge of local offerings lagged behind Western titles. They included the 2009 spy thriller “The Message,” animation blockbuster “Ne Zha,” a new arthouse film “A First Farewell,” and “Chinese Odyssey Part Two: Cinderella,” all of which grossed less than $200,000.

The total nationwide weekend box office was $12.6 million (RMB88.6 million).

That result is far and away better than the pathetic whimper of business that cinemas did in late March, when there was greater uncertainty about the patterns of COVID-19 in China. At that time, authorities allowed around 500 cinemas — approximately 5% of China’s total — to re-open in low-risk regions, but they collectively earned just $10,000 (RMB72,000) in their opening weekend. They were quickly ordered shut again without explanation soon after.

This time around, China hopes things will be different. More cinemas are opening with a greater degree of official support and a larger selection of films at a time when the public has already been comfortably galavanting about returning to spaces like tourist sites, restaurants and malls in most of the country for months.

Reports from Chinese state media and listed film companies — parties admittedly interested in trumpeting a rapid rebound — touted cinemas’ current recovery as “faster than expected,” having risen from a single-day box office of RMB3 million ($428,000) to RMB30 million ($4.28 million) in just six days. They celebrated that the national box office has already broken the RMB100 million mark and that a million tickets have already been sold.

Though China’s early numbers are encouraging at a time when cinemas around the world are shutting for the foreseeable future, there is still room for growth.

This weekend’s nationwide ticket sales amounted to just a quarter of January’s average weekend box office pre-shutdowns, and just 16% of the weekend average for last year’s much busier month of December, according to Variety’s calculations.

Beijing was given the green light to re-open its cinemas on Friday just in time for this opening weekend, six months to the day of when cinemas initially shut due to COVID-19. Meanwhile, however, cinemas in the northeastern port city of Dalian, home to some seven million people, were abruptly ordered shut Thursday just as they were in the midst of reopening due to a new surge of coronavirus cases there.

IMAX cinemas began to re-open from Friday. As of Sunday, 369 of its more than 700 screens in China were back in back in business. The company expects at least 600 of its theaters will be up and running again by mid-August.

Like other exhibitors, IMAX China has been hammered by the extended closures, warning earlier this week of expected losses of up to $36 million in the first half of the year. Globally, however, IMAX was up 30% this weekend from last, with a overall cume of $1.3 million from theaters worldwide.

In China, “Dolittle” earned $535,000 from 266 IMAX screens, accounting for 11% of its national weekend gross, while “Bloodshot” earned $210,000 from 228 IMAX screens, accounting for about 7% of its nation-wide earnings.

Upcoming China premieres and re-runs of foreign films currently include: “Sonic the Hedgehog,” “Jojo Rabbit,” “Big Hero 6,” “47 Meters Down: Uncaged,” and France’s “Mia and the White Lion” on July 31; “Interstellar” on Aug. 2; “Ford vs. Ferrari” and “1917” on Aug. 7; “Bad Boys for Life” on Aug. 14; and “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone 3D” on Aug. 14.

[GeneChing]

I can hardly wait for US theaters to reopen.



Jul 27, 2020 4:11pm PT
Regal Cinemas Announces August Reopening of U.S. Theaters (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/regal-us-theaters-august-reopening-1234717838/)
By Dave McNary

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/07/losangelesareaattractions231867.jpg?w=600
Michael Buckner for Variety

Regal Cinemas, the nation’s second largest cinema chain, has announced that it will begin to reopen its U.S. locations on Aug. 21.

Regal’s U.K. parent Cineworld made the announcement on Monday afternoon following Warner Bros. disclosure that it will open Christopher Nolan’s sci-fi thriller “Tenet” in international markets on Aug. 26 with a Sept. 3 launch in the U.S.

“Welcoming theatergoers back to our cinemas will be a celebration for not only our team and our industry, but most importantly for the fans who have been anxiously awaiting the year’s upcoming releases,” said Mooky Greidinger, CEO of Cineworld. “With the health and safety of our staff, customers and communities as our top priority, we are happy to invite audiences to return to the timeless theatrical experience that we have all dearly missed.”

Along with AMC and Cinemark, Regal closed down U.S. sites in mid-March due to the COVID-19 pandemic — which profoundly altered the spring and summer slate. “Wonder Woman 1984” was moved to October and James Bond title “No Time to Die” has been slotted for November while many major titles have been taken off the schedule, gone out on streaming services or dated for 2021.

Titles currently set to open domestically on Aug. 21 are “Unhinged” from Solstice Studios and “Antebellum” from Lionsgate.

Theaters in Los Angeles, New York and many other locations have not yet been given an approved reopening date by their health departments. It’s too early to say how many locations could be approved by Aug. 21.

Regal operates 549 locations in 42 states. It also said Monday it will enforce previously announced health and safety measures that adhere to the latest public health guidelines, including innovative sanitization procedures, new social distancing protocols, and mandatory mask policies for Regal employees and guests. The news was first reported by Deadline Hollywood.

Who's going back to the movies next month?

[GeneChing]

Relevant nonetheless



MOVIES
AMC Theatres, Universal Collapsing Theatrical Window to 17 Days in Unprecedented Pact (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/amc-theatres-universal-collapsing-theatrical-window-17-days-unprecedented-pact-1304759)
1:30 PM PDT 7/28/2020 by Pamela McClintock

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2020/07/donna_langley_and_adam_aron-getty-split_-h_2020_.jpg
Tolga AKMEN / AFP; Amy Sussman/FilmMagic
Donna Langley, Adam Aron

The studio will have the option of making any of its titles, as well as films from Focus Features, available on premium VOD after just three weekends of play in cinemas.
In a stunning reversal, AMC Theatres has struck a historic agreement with Universal that will allow the studio's movies to be made available on premium video-on-demand after just 17 days of play in cinemas, including three weekends, the two companies announced Tuesday.

The deal — which presently only covers AMC's U.S. locations — shatters the traditional theatrical window, a longstanding policy that has required studios to play their films on the big screen for nearly three months before making films available in the home. The unprecedented move on the part of a mega-exhibitor has far-reaching implications for the film business — particularly amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and related theater closures — and is a major coup for Universal.

AMC, the country and world's largest theater chain, is expected to share in the revenue from PVOD. The debt-laden company was hit particularly hard because of the pandemic, although recently found new institutional investors.

More than any other studio, Universal has pushed for years to shorten the theatrical window, but it has backed down in the face of boycott threats from AMC and other major exhibitors. And in March, AMC CEO Adam Aron, in a sharp rebuke, said his company was going to boycott all Universal titles after the studio said it would make Trolls World Tour immediately available on PVOD and in any theaters that were left open in early April. (NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell has been an ardent advocate for early home offerings and revealed in a subsequent interview that Trolls made a huge $100 million in U.S. PVOD rentals.)

Tuesday's announcement did not say what the cost for premium VOD titles would be, but Trolls and other recent films have been priced at $19.99 for a 48-hour rental window. Sources suggest AMC may receive 10 percent of each rental.

The PVOD policy was part of a multiyear agreement in which AMC agreed to play Universal films. The deal includes at least three weekends of theatrical exclusivity for all Universal Pictures and Focus Features theatrical releases, at which time the studio will have the option to make its titles available across PVOD platforms. Universal said its traditional windows for electronic sell-through and regular VOD remain unchanged.

In the coming weeks, the two companies will begin PVOD discussions regarding AMC locations overseas in Europe and the Middle East.

At the onset of the pandemic, Universal decided to move many of its 2020 tentpoles to 2021, including F9 and the next Jurassic World installment. The studio, however, does have international distribution rights to November’s James Bond pic No Time to Die. It’s unclear whether the AMC-Universal deal could impact the film in those territories where AMC operates. (MGM is the Bond film's domestic distributor.)

In a joint release, Universal and AMC said they reached the historic agreement based on their "shared commitment to a mutually beneficial long-term partnership that is focused on serving consumers worldwide, while preserving and enhancing the theatrical experience." Insiders added that the deal provides consumers with options during uncertain times.

“The theatrical experience continues to be the cornerstone of our business," said Donna Langley, chair of Universal Filmed Entertainment Group. "The partnership we’ve forged with AMC is driven by our collective desire to ensure a thriving future for the film distribution ecosystem and to meet consumer demand with flexibility and optionality.”

Added Aron: “AMC enthusiastically embraces this new industry model both because we are participating in the entirety of the economics of the new structure, and because premium video on demand creates the added potential for increased movie studio profitability, which should in turn lead to the green-lighting of more theatrical movies. This multi-year agreement preserves exclusivity for theatrical viewing for at least the first three weekends of a film’s release, during which time a considerable majority of a movie’s theatrical box office revenue typically is generated."

The exact terms of the deal are not being disclosed.

PAMELA MCCLINTOCK
THRnews@thr.com
PamelaDayM

[GeneChing]

Jul 29, 2020 8:26pm PT
‘Tenet’ Approved for Theatrical Release in China (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/tenet-china-release-1234720583/)
By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/04/tenet-nolan.jpg?w=600
Melinda Sue Gordon

“Tenet” announced Wednesday that it has passed government approvals for a theatrical release in China, an indication that an official release date is now on the horizon.

The film has released a poster in Chinese, swapping the English tagline “time runs out” for a clarion call to return to cinemas that roughly translates to “make every second count; invade the theaters.”

Chinese cinemas reopened in regions at low risk for COVID-19 on July 20, taking in $12.6 million in their opening weekend. Currently, around 44% of its cinemas are back in business, but have been required to operate at just 30% capacity to allow for social distancing, as well as reduce their total number of screenings to half their usual tally.

Additionally, guidelines for reopening released by the National Film Bureau request that cinemas not screen films that are over two hours long — which could potentially pose problems for “Tenet,” which runs at two hours and 31 minutes.

This directive was soon contradicted, however, by Chinese authorities’ subsequent approval of numerous films longer than two hours for nationwide theatrical release. These include “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” and Nolan’s own “Interstellar” — currently scheduled for a theatrical re-run starting Aug. 2 — as well as local blockbusters already in play like “Operation Red Sea.”

Until the guideline is more formally lifted, it appears that cinemas in different regions under different levels of COVID-19 threat have been given varied amounts of leeway, or at least have been variously willing to stick their neck out and program longer films.

All eight of the “Harry Potter” films run over two hours, but they are all currently screening as part of the Shanghai International Film Festival.

Yet at least two cinemas in Beijing said Wednesday in private chats posted to social media that due to the confusion, they currently didn’t dare program approved, available titles over 120 minutes long — even the patriotic blockbuster “Wolf Warrior 2,” which runs 123 minutes.

Elsewhere in China, however, that film’s re-run has already made $1.1 million since cinemas reopened Monday.

“Tenet” had to reschedule its release numerous times due to COVID-19 before Warner Brothers this week settled on the unconventional plan of debuting it internationally before it hits North America.

It is now prepared to open in around 70 countries abroad starting on Aug. 26, including the U.K., Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea and Russia. It will then premiere in select U.S. cities over Labor Day weekend from Sept. 3.

China is far and away the most important foreign market for “Tenet” director Christopher Nolan’s films.

The Chinese box office for almost every film he’s made as either director or executive producer has blown away earnings from other territories by a large margin. The only exceptions are “Dunkirk” and “The Dark Knight Rises,” for which China was the second largest market globally behind the U.K., and “Batman Begins,” which hit the Middle Kingdom all the way back in 2005, when its box office was still comparatively nascent.

Of the Nolan-directed films, “Dunkirk” made $51 million in China in 2017, while “Interstellar” grossed $122 million there in 2014. The “Dark Knight Rises” grossed $52.8 million in 2012 and “Inception” $68.4 million in 2010.

Films executive produced by Nolan have also seen strong showings in the country. They include “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” with $96 million, “Justice League” with $106 million, “Transcendence” with $20 million, and “Man of Steel” with $63 million.

threads
Tenet (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71638-Tenet)
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

Coincidentally, I just watched Doolittle last night (not going to review it here although there are some sword brandishing but no real sword fights). Produced $175 million, earned $126 million, plus now another 11.8 million. Still a ways to go...



'Dolittle' Tops China Box Office, 'Interstellar' Rerelease Scores Single-Day Record Since Reopening (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/dolittle-tops-china-box-office-interstellar-rerelease-scores-single-day-record-1305561)
10:06 PM PDT 8/2/2020 by Abid Rahman

https://cdn1.thr.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/landscape_928x523/2020/08/interstellar_dolittle.jpg
Paramount Pictures/Universal Pictures
'Interstellar' and 'Dolittle'

With limits on the number of screens, a wary public and social distancing measures in place, weekend box office in China hit a modest $17.5 million.

Universal's Dolittle topped China's box office for a second week as the country's cinemas continued their tentative reopening following the novel coronavirus shutdown.

With limits on the number of screens, a wary public and social distancing measures in place, weekend box office in China hit a modest $17.5 million according to local box office consultancy Artisan Gateway. This weekend's gross takes this year's severely truncated China box office total to $364.1 million, a 93.2 percent drop year on year. At the same point last year, China's box office was humming along at $5.4 billion.

Dolittle's $3.3 million take was enough to secure consecutive weekends at the top in China, giving the fantasy film a 10-day total of $11.8 million. Produced for a hefty $175 million, Dolittle bombed disastrously in North America, and has earned just $126 million worldwide prior to its China release. The sluggish performance of China's box office since the restart is unlikely to add too much to Dolittle's final cume, despite Robert Downey Jr's unquestioned Marvel-powered popularity in the country.

In second place was the local drama The Enigma of Arrival which debuted with $3 million. A new release, something of a rarity as cinemas reopen, Song Wen's Enigma was first screened at Busan Film Festival in 2018 and was originally scheduled to be released in China in February before being moved in calendar due to the lockdown.

With the conspicuous lack of new films in recent weeks, the rerelease of Christopher Nolan's Interstellar was the story of the weekend in China. Debuting on Sunday, Interstellar's $2.8 million take, boosted by its presence at over 400 higher priced IMAX theaters, was the biggest opening of any film since China's cinemas officially reopened. The 2014 sci-fi epic, which stars Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain, also secured the biggest single-day performance since the restart.

Including its original run, Interstellar has now grossed $111 million in China, according to Artisan Gateway, and its performance bodes well for the Middle Kingdom release of Nolan's high concept sci-fi movie Tenet, which has cleared the country's censors but is yet to be given a release date.

Rounding out the top five is two local films, the rerelease of Sam Quah's 2019 crime drama Sheep Without a Shepherd in fourth place with $2.4 million and the animated new release Mr. Miao in fifth with $1.2 million. A remake of the Indian thriller Drishyam, Sheep Without a Shepherd was a big commercial and critical hit when it was first released in December, and its total cume now stands at $180.4 million.

ABID RAHMAN
abid.rahman@thr.com
@gentlemanabroad

[GeneChing]

Aug 11, 2020 4:56pm PT
China to Ease Limits on Movie Ticket Sales, Screening Length Starting This Weekend (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/china-coronavirus-theater-rules-eased-1234732317/)
By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/07/tenent.jpg?w=600
Melinda Sue Gordon/Warner Bros.

Cinemas in some parts of China have been told that they may now sell up to 50% of their available tickets for each screening and play films over two hours in length without restrictions starting from Aug. 14, local reports and leaked directives show.

Concessions may also now be sold — not to snack on in theaters, but, amusingly, as take-away.

The easing of theater restrictions is a big positive sign for the China box office prospects of Disney’s “Mulan,” which confirmed on Monday it would hit Chinese theaters “soon,” and Christopher Nolan’s “Tenet,” which is set to debut in the country on Sept. 4.

COVID-19 has dealt a blow to the global box office dreams of both films, with Disney choosing to forgo theatrical in most markets and release its live-action remake on its own streaming platform.

Chinese cinemas reopened for the first time in six months on July 20. Initial national guidelines required them to cap ticket sales at just 30% of their max capacity to allow for more extensive social distancing. They also banned the sale and consumption of concessions, and requested that screenings not go over two hours. Local authorities in some regions began asking cinemas to program a short intermission into longer films, but not others.

Now, the screening length issue appears to cleared up in time for the weekend debut of two hotly anticipated longer titles: a 3D, 4K restoration of “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” and the censored Chinese war epic “The Eight Hundred,” which both open Friday. “Bad Boys for Life” starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, which runs at 123 minutes, is also set to premiere alongside them.

Giving cinemas the ability to sell up to half the available seats for each showing will be a welcome boon for exhibitors. Business has been “better than expected,” analysts say, but still slow as audiences appear to await more enticing offerings.

The most successful cinema in the country, a five-hall, 565-seat venue on Hainan island, sold 1,379 tickets worth $7,000 on Tuesday.

The images below show the seating availability for two different Imax theaters in Beijing last Saturday night for the opening weekend of “1917.” The red icons indicate seats already taken, while the grey, locked seats are those left empty for social distancing purposes. For a major title on the most popular weekend evening, the 30% capacity rule left most good seats occupied, leaving only options at the very front or side.

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/taopiaopiao-tickets.png?w=600
Courtesy of Tao Piaopiao

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/taopiaopiao-tickets2.png?w=600
Recently, a few other foreign titles have announced an upcoming theatrical outing in China.
Courtesy of Tao Piaopiao

They include the 2017 U.S. historical drama “The Current War,” starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Thomas Edison and Nicholas Hoult as Nikola Tesla, which will arrive in China on Aug. 28. Co-produced by Harvey Weinstein and originally set for distribution by The Weinstein Company, the film’s release got caught up in Weinstein’s sexual abuse scandal and did not debut until last fall. It’s made $12 million worldwide so far, with $6 million of that from North America.

Two Japanese titles are also preparing to hit cinemas. They are the 1999 Cannes competition title “Kikujiro” — written, directed and starring Takeshi Kitano — which has yet to set a date, and “Masquerade Hotel,” a 2019 crime film directed by Masayuki Suzuki that will premiere in China on Sept. 4.

threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

AMC Theatres to Reopen Next Week at 15 Cents Per Movie (https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/amc-theatres-reopen-next-week-15-cents-per-movie/)
AMC Theatres announced 100 theaters will reopen on Aug. 20 with the cost of 15 cents per ticket.
By David Crow
|
August 13, 2020

https://www.denofgeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/AMC-Theatres.jpg?resize=768%2C432
AMC Theatres
Photo: Noam Galai / Getty Images

“Movies in 2020 at 1920 Prices.” That is the amusing slogan AMC Theatres trumpeted Thursday in relation to their confirmation of 100 movie theaters definitely reopening across North America. With this reopening signaling one-sixth of their U.S. locations being ready for business in a week’s time, AMC will charge only 15 cents per ticket on the first day of the rollout.

The pricing is an amusing gimmick that harkens back to when going to the movies was not only safe but also the primary form of populist entertainment in the U.S. Indeed, if one was to argue, like director Christopher Nolan has, that cinema is the most democratic form of art, it’s with those kind of prices that it became possible. Of course by Aug. 20 none of the intended studio wide releases on which theaters are resting hope will be out to reawakening audiences’ appetites.

Indeed, The New Mutants, the first major studio wide release since March, does not open until Aug. 28. And Tenet, the real tentpole that theaters are banking on to be truly must-see, does not open in “select U.S. cities” until Sept. 3. Even Solstice Pictures’ Unhinged, which stars Russell Crowe as a maniac driver, doesn’t bow until Aug. 21.

But the novel approach of returning to ‘20s era prices in a different decade is a gambit designed to get those who really miss moviegoing to try AMC locations out on the first day, likely by watching old favorites such as Nolan’s Inception, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary. Of course it’s trying to get audiences to try it during the heat of the coronavirus pandemic.

Despite infection rates going down in May, infection rates have increased again this summer, particularly in states like Florida, Georgia, Arizona, and California. For that reason, movie theaters remain mandatorily closed in more than 10 states, and in major moviegoing markets like New York City.

Still, AMC Theatres is pledging that the reopening will come with new safety features which include reduced capacity seating to enforce social distancing, new ventilation systems in the theaters, and an emphasis on no-contact ticket buying and concessions. Perhaps in AMC’s biggest acceptance of the current health crisis though is the theater chain agreeing to require moviegoers to wear masks… but that only came after backlash to the initial announcement that mask-wearing would merely be a guideline and AMC did not want to wade into the “politics” of hard science.

Still, on Aug. 20 you can expect to get some version of the 1920 experience. Just hope it isn’t the 1919 one when the Spanish Flu still was hanging on.

threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

China Box Office: 3D 'Harry Potter' Rerelease Wins the Weekend (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-3d-harry-potter-rerelease-wins-the-weekend)
11:33 PM PDT 8/16/2020 by Abid Rahman

https://static.hollywoodreporter.com/sites/default/files/2020/08/harry_potter_and_the_sorcerers_stone_-_photofest_still_3_-_h_2020_-compressed.jpg
Warner Bros./Photofest
'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone'

'Bad Boys For Life' bombs as previews for local war epic 'The Eight Hundred' point to a monster opening next weekend.
Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone cast its spell over the box office in China this weekend, as Hollywood rereleases continue to entice people back to recently reopened cinemas.

The 3D, 4K rerelease of the first film in Warner Bros' multi-billion dollar franchise was able to magic up a stellar $13.4 million this weekend, according to local box office consultancy Artisan Gateway. The strong showing from The Sorcerer's Stone pushed the total box office to $21.9 million, the best single weekend performance since China's cinemas reopened.

Theaters in China are now into their fourth week of reopening after a COVID-19 enforced lockdown put in place back in January. Despite the restart, the country's exhibitors are still operating with limits on the number of screens and strict social distancing measures on top of having a public still wary about returning to the movies. The stronger week-to-week performance is in stark contrast to the year-on-year decline of 92.8 percent.

Puffed up partly by higher-priced IMAX admissions, on Saturday The Sorcerer's Stone scored the biggest single-day take since the restart and its total China gross, including all previous releases, now stands at $21.4 million according to Artisan Gateway. The China rerelease of the 2001 film, based on the first book of J.K. Rowling's phenomenally successful book series, is edging the movie closer to a $1 billion worldwide cume.

In second place was Sony's delayed release of Bad Boys For Life which made a modest $3.1 million. The post-COVID-19 theatrical landscape has notably lacked new Hollywood releases but the third film in the Bad Boys franchise didn't bring the crowds out, with the film hampered by its lukewarm critical reception including a 5.7/10 rating on the popular media review platform Douban.

Coming in third was local war epic The Eight Hundred which made an impressive $2 million in previews. Directed by Guan Hu and produced by Huayi Bros., The Eight Hundred is an $80 million tentpole based on a pivotal battle in 1937 during the Sino-Japanese war: the historic siege and defense of the Si Hang Warehouse in Shanghai where 400 fighters, an unlikely mix of soldiers, deserters and civilians became known as the “Eight Hundred Heroes," after holding out against waves of Japanese forces for four days and four nights.

The hotly anticipated war film was originally supposed to be released last summer but had its world premiere dramatically pulled from the Shanghai Film Festival and then its nationwide release canceled at the 11th hour by China's censors, although no official reason has ever been given.

With stellar reviews, an 8.1 rating on Douban and buoyed by nationalistic fervor, The Eight Hundred should breakout big next weekend when it goes on general release.

The rerelease of Christopher Nolan's Interstellar continued to rack up solid numbers, making another $1.3 million this weekend. Including its original run, the 2014 sci-fi epic, which stars Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain, has now made $123.9 million in China.

Interstellar's strong performance and Nolan's name recognition in China bodes well for the Middle Kingdom release of his high concept sci-fi movie Tenet, which has cleared the country's censors and is set to be released on Sept. 4. To drum up a little more Nolan-mania in China, Warner Bros. is also rereleasing Inception in the country on Aug. 28.

Rounding out the top five this weekend was the rerelease of Sam Quah's 2019 crime drama Sheep Without a Shepherd which made $1.1 million and now has a cume of $187.7 million.


ABID RAHMAN
abid.rahman@thr.com
gentlemanabroad


threads
Harry-Potter (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?37539-Harry-Potter)
chollywood (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

Aug 17, 2020 12:00pm PT
Peter Chan’s Volleyball Drama ‘Leap’ to Hit China Over National Day (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/peter-chan-leap-national-day-1234737468/)

By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/leap-image-cropped.jpg?w=600
"Leap"

Peter Chan’s hotly anticipated biographical sports drama “Leap” is set to hit China on Sept. 30, becoming the first of the Chinese New Year blockbusters canceled due to COVID-19 to set a theatrical outing.

Local animation “Jiang Ziya: Legend of Deification,” which was also originally scheduled to premiere over the lunar new year, will premiere the day after. They will both hit theaters over the China’s patriotic National Day holiday that begins Oct. 1, typically one of the busiest movie-going weeks of the year.

They will compete against the patriotic anthology film “My People, My Homeland,” a sequel to last National Day’s “My People, My Country,” and Chinese comedy “Coffee or Tea?,” as well as a local animated take on the classic “Mulan” legend.

The fact that major new local blockbusters are now willing to set release dates is a signal of renewed confidence in China’s box office, as cinemas slowly get back on their feet after six months of closures. Theaters are still currently only allowed to sell up to 50% of their available tickets to enable social distancing.

Seven major films were expected to release Jan. 24 over the lunar new year holiday, but all were pulled just before their premieres as COVID-19 swept the country and made mass cinema-going look less and less feasible. Theaters were officially ordered shut by authorities just afterwards.

Of those titles, “Leap” is the first to set a theatrical release date. The others include helmer Dante Lam’s “The Rescue,” Wanda’s “Detective Chinatown 3,” Stanley Tong’s Jackie Chan-starring “Vanguard” and two animations, “Jiang Ziya” and “Boonie Bears: The Wild Life.”

Xu Zheng’s “Lost in Russia,” which was thematically tied to the lunar new year holiday, stoked controversy by deciding to skip theatrical altogether and release for free via ByteDance’s video platforms, including Douyin (China’s version of TikTok), Toutiao and Watermelon video.

“Leap” tells the story of the Chinese women’s national volleyball team and their tribulations over the course of decades. It features Huang Bo (“The Island,” “Crazy Alien”) and Gong Li, who stars as the legendary coach Lang Ping.

Threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Mulan (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68640-Mulan-(2020))
Jiang Ziya: Legend of Deification (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71621-Legend-of-Deification-Jiang-Ziya)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

When covid first struck, I thought it would hobble the rise of China's film industry. Now it looks like it was just what was needed to eclipse Hollywood.



Aug 27, 2020 7:05pm PT
China Is World’s First Market to Achieve Full Box Office Recovery, Says Analytics Firm (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/china-first-box-office-recovery-1234751777/)
By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/eight-hundred-a-cr-res-e5ae88e5869be88bb1e58b87e68ab5e68a97e68cafe5a58be5 85a8e59bbde5908ce8839e.jpg?w=600
The Eight Hundred
Courtesy of Huayi Bros

China this week became the first global market to make a “full box office recovery” according to targets developed by the U.K.-based film industry analytics firm Gower Street, the company said Thursday.

The firm created five targets to track and compare the paths of different territories’ exhibition sectors back to recovery. The indicators move from stage one — a point when a significant majority (80%) of cinemas are ready to resume operations — to stage five, in which business over the course of a week is equivalent to that of the top quartile of weekly earnings from the past two years.

After reaching this stage five goal, a particular market “should react as normal, with an ebb and flow dependent on the release calendar,” Gower Street explained.

To reach that target, post-COVID China needed to generate a weekly box office of $184 million (RMB1.27 billion). According to data from Comscore Movies, China hit this target just five days into the week starting Friday, Aug. 21, having taken in $189 million (RMB1.31 billion) by the end of the day Tuesday.

China’s national box office for the full week was $252 million (RMB1.74 billion), more than 18% greater than that of the equivalent week in 2019, which saw earnings of around $209 million (RMB1.44 billion).

More than 90% of Chinese cinemas by market share are now open, although they continue to operate with capacity restrictions allowing them to sell only half their available tickets.

Despite these limitations, China’s performance stands out worldwide at a time when nearly 65% of global cinemas by market share are now back in business in the wake of COVID-19 closures, up from 55% a week ago, Gower Street said.

The global box office so far in 2020 is just $6.88 billion, a fraction of the $27.2 billion three year average year to date score. Nevertheless, sales are increasing, with the $200 million collected globally this week marking a rise of 54% from the one previous. China, said Gower Street, was “undoubtedly the driver” of this growth.

This week’s success was due to massive sales for local war film “The Eight Hundred,” as well as Tuesday’s Qixi Festival, a type of Chinese Valentine’s day, which saw the release of popular local time-travel rom-com “Love You Forever,” which grossed more than $39 million on its opening day.

Giving the box office a further mid-week boost, local romantic drama “Wild Grass” and Greta Gerwig’s Oscar-winning “Little Women” also premiered Tuesday, debuting to the tune of $5.5 million and $1.5 million on day one, respectively, according to data from Maoyan.

This week’s box office tally accounts for nearly a third of all ticket sales in China to date this year, with “The Eight Hundred” alone accounting of 27% of the national 2020 box office as of Wednesday. The film has grossed $210 million (RMB1.45 billion) and Maoyan now projects a total of $459 million (RMB3.16 billion).

ADVERTISEMENTSCROLL TO CONTINUE READING
The Chinese market’s revival comes just in time for Christopher Nolan’s “Tenet,” which is set to further galvanize recovery once it premieres in the country on Sept. 4. A re-release of his “Inception” will compete with “The Eight Hundred” once it hits cinemas on Friday.

Disney’s “Mulan” has yet to receive an official release date in the territory, but is expected to hit theaters in the near future.


Threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Mulan (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?68640-Mulan-(2020))
800 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71303-The-Eight-Hundred)
Tenet (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71638-Tenet)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

The U.S. is a long way from that now...



Sep 15, 2020 4:16pm PT
China’s Cinemas to Soon Operate at 75% Capacity, as Pandemic Restrictions Ease (https://variety.com/2020/film/news/china-coronavirus-cinema-capacity-1234771285/)

By Rebecca Davis

https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/leap-image-cropped.jpg?w=600
"Leap"
China announced on Tuesday that it will soon relax pandemic-related restrictions currently placed on cinemas and allow venues to sell up to 75% of their available tickets.

Chinese cinemas are currently limited to just half capacity, but can shift over to selling 75% of their available tickets from Sept. 25, the China Film Distribution & Projection Association said in new guidelines released on their official social media accounts.

The move is a boon to struggling exhibitors, who have suffered through six months of shutdowns this year and only re-opened their doors in late July. It also comes after the release of Hollywood tentpoles “Tenet” and “Mulan,” but just as major Chinese blockbusters are set to bow over the upcoming National Day holiday.

Chinese authorities are seeking to ramp up cinema-going ahead of that period, when a slew of patriotic films will hit theaters, intended to boost morale and feelings of national pride.

Notably, Peter Chan’s “Leap,” a volleyball drama starring Gong Li that was initially supposed to launch over Chinese New Year, has shifted its originally scheduled release five days earlier to stand out from the crowd, and is now set to debut on Sept. 25 — the same day the new guidelines will come into effect.

Eight other films will fight for attention in what is turning out to be an unexpectedly competitive battle. Most notably, they include two other Chinese New Year blockbusters, the hotly anticipated animation “Jiang Ziya: Legend of Deification” and Jackie Chan-starrer “Vanguard,” as well as the patriotic omnibus film “My People, My Homeland” and, incongruously, the 1999 Japanese road movie “Kikujiro,” starring, written and directed by Takeshi Kitano.

The new pandemic rules require continued vigilance from cinemas on coronavirus prevention, stating that key public areas such as lobbies, corridors and screening halls should be disinfected with spray no less than twice a day, while places like toilets, vending machines and seats in public areas should be wiped down at least five times a day.

Tickets will remain sold online-only, via reservations attached to people’s real names, and retrieved without human contact via vending machines.

threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

Asian Films Dominate Global Box Office While US Films Struggle (https://www.newsweek.com/asian-films-rule-box-office-1540338)
BY JON JACKSON ON 10/19/20 AT 12:28 PM EDT

The Japanese anime adventure Demon Slaver The Movie: Mugen Train was named the best performing film in the world this past weekend, while China surpassed all of North America as the world's largest box office earner.

The coronavirus pandemic continues to drastically restrict any movies that dare opening in front of live audiences in theaters, with Liam Neeson's Honest Thief bringing in a very modest $3.7 million over a three-day opening in the US, with a cumulative total of around $4.2 million in North American when including its haul in Canada. Taking the second spot was critically-maligned The War with Grandpa, followed by Christopher Nolan's Tenet, which increased its domestic total to $50.6 million in eight weekends of release—the high-water mark for any film released in the US after the pandemic hit.

https://d.newsweek.com/en/full/1570075/demon-slayer.webp?w=790&f=e4004850faf7835ca992ed063693eac9
Demon Slayer, from hit Japanese show to the world's box office film champ.
ANIPLEX

These totals are not unexpected given many theaters remain shuttered throughout the country, including all indoor cinemas in New York City.

Meanwhile, Japan's Demon Slayer opened with an a robust $44 million over three days, breaking box office records there to become the biggest launch in Japanese history. These numbers are even more impressive when compared to last year's Japanese opening of Frozen 2, which brought in $30 million over a three-day period and finished its theatrical run there with $121 million. Demon Slayer managed to bring in its massive total even with spaced seating that limits admissions to about half of normal capacity in Japan.

Demon Slayer no doubt benefitted from its popular source material—a Gotoge Koyoharu comic that since its first appearance in 2016 has gone on to print nearly 100 million copies circulating in paperback editions and digital formats. Before the new feature film, the comic spawned a popular TV anime series in 2019 that's been distributed on Netflix, Amazon and Hulu. North American audiences will have their first chance to catch the feature-length film in early 2021.

Meanwhile, China continued its domination of the global box office for the year as it closed in on $2 billion on Sunday after adding $46.4 million over the weekend. This came despited a 32% decline from last weekend's box office totals in China and no major new release. That nearly $2 billion total was enough for China to take the 2020 global crown over North America's $1.94 billion, according to consultancy Artisan Gateway. However, these totals conflict slightly from the numbers found by Comscore, another industry-reporting agency, which has North America at $2.085 billion and nearly $100 million above China. Though, even by those statistics, China should soon surpass North America. It could happen as soon as this weekend, when the highly-anticipated Korean War drama Sacrifice (or Jin Gang Chuan, as its known locally) opens in China on October 23.

Current box office champs in China include My People, My Homeland, which added $25.6 million for a $366 million total, and Jiang Ziya: Legend Of Deification, which sits at at $228 million in its run thus far. The country's World War II epic The Eight Hundred remains the most successful movie of the year globally with $460 million and growing. The second highest-grossing film globally is Bad Boys for Life at $426.5 million, which it accomplished as one of the last North American major releases before the coronavirus shutdown.

Back in the US, the box office picture continues to look bleak with many of the season's major blockbusters being pushed forward to 2021 or getting VOD/streaming channel releases. Still, Disney managed to find a bright spot by simply re-introducing older hits to theaters again. These catalogue releases, The Nightmare Before Christmas and Hocus Pocus, took the fourth and fifth spots at the box office with I think this article got cut off...

[GeneChing]

Not to be confused with the 2010 Sacrifice (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?65087-Sacrifice).



Oct 25, 2020 8:00pm PT
China Box Office: ‘Sacrifice’ Sweeps to $53 Million Opening Weekend (https://variety.com/2020/film/asia/china-box-office-sacrifice-sweeps-to-opening-weekend-victory-1234815365/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Sacrifice-p2622752949-lcr.jpg
Courtesy of China Film Group
Meeting only minimal resistance, Chinese-made war film “Sacrifice” invaded the box office and secured a quick victory against already battle-weary opponents.

The film released on Friday and in three days earned $53.0 million according to data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway. It occupied the majority of available theatrical territory and clocked up a per screen average of $422 on Saturday alone.

The Artisan Gateway data points to an aggregate weekend gross of $76.9 million. The running total of $2.10 billion for the year to date is still 75% down on this time last year.

Released to coincide with official celebrations that mark China’s role in the Korean War (known in China as The War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea), “Sacrifice” is a tale of courage under fire that focuses on Chinese forces repairing a bridge, while coming under repeated American bombardment. The narrative very much fits with that of the current “Cold War” between the world’s two wealthiest nations. And cinema and TV screens will see several other films, documentaries and series on the same subject.

“Sacrifice” is made by three of China’s most commercially-successful directors Guan Hu (“The Eight Hundred”), Frant Gwo (“The Wandering Earth”) and Lu Yang (“Brotherhood of Blades”). And stars Wu Jing (“Wolf Warrior”), Deng Chao (“Shadow”, “The Mermaid”) star, along with several veterans of “The Eight Hundred” including Li Juixiao and Vision Wei.

With patriotism the flavor of the moment in Chinese entertainment, propaganda omnibus film “My People, My Homeland” placed second over the weekend. It earned $11.2 million for a 25-day cumulative gross of $389 million.

Chinese animation “Jiang Ziya: Legend of Deification” came a distant third with $2.8 million, for a cumulative of $233 million. “Coffee or Tea” took $2.5 million for fourth place, and a cumulative of $40.6 million after 22 days, while romance “The Story of Xi Bao” earned $2.4 million in fifth place for a total of $14.3 million. Patriotic sports drama “Leap” earned $2.33 million for a total of $120 million after 31 days.

Chinese culture, beliefs and rituals were all part of big-budget animation film “Over The Moon,” but Chinese audiences did not bite into this particular seasonal delicacy. It earned just RMB4 million or $600,000, despite having as many as 11,000 screenings on Saturday.

The film was made as a co-production between China’s Pearl Studios (predominantly owned by CMC since Dreamworks sold its shares) and global streaming company Netflix. China was the only territory where it got a theatrical outing.

The timing of the release, however, was curious. It came some three weeks after the mid-autumn festival that the film celebrates through its narratives of family reunion, food and the moon goddess Chang’e. As mid-autumn festival overlapped with the Oct. 1 National Day celebrations, it might suggest that Chinese traditions are trumped by party politics.


Threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Sacrifice (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71906-Sacrifice)

[GeneChing]

Right now, the PRC film market is the only one that is open. Is that pandering?


Nov 1, 2017 6:03pm PT
Hollywood Scripts And Casting Pandering to China Box Office (Report) (https://variety.com/2017/film/asia/hollywood-pandering-to-china-report-1202604376/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/gravity-reald-3d.jpg
Courtesy of Warner Bros.
Hollywood has long been accused of pandering to China – soft-pedalling in order not to give offense. Now comes a study by Hong Kong production company Dragon Horse Films attempts to quantify just how far Western entertainment conglomerates are self-censoring.

The company says that there is a correlation between the size of the Chinese box office and the number of Hollywood decisions to avoid negative Chinese story lines and characters.

It says that a tipping point occurred in 2011 when the Chinese theatrical box office exceeded $2 billion. That put it on a par with grosses from Japan and on course to become the world’s second largest B.O. territory. China’s B.O. last year hit $6.4 billion and is now forecast to approach $8 billion in 2017.

“With the rising importance of the mainland Chinese box office, Hollywood and Hong Kong producers routinely self-censor stories to appease Beijing’s strict censorship rules,” says Michael T. George of MTG Asia Ltd, who contributed to the report. “That means anything intellectually challenging is to be avoided. No politics. No social issues. Not even a wisp of irony. Authorities must always be portrayed in a positive light – unless they are corrupt foreigners.”

The report, which catalogs 120 English-language movies, with Chinese storylines or characters, that have been released since China opened its economy in 1978, says that Chinese bad guys are still seen in some English language movies, but these are usually co-productions with mainland Chinese partners. That means scripts must be submitted to censors in the same way as if they were local Chinese films. It gives the example of “Smart Chase” and “Skiptrace.”

Alternatively, if Hollywood producers feature Chinese villains, they cast Western actors, such as Dave Bautista in “Enter the Warrior’s Gate.” An alternate strategy is to cast other Asians, often Koreans. Examples there include Luc Besson’s “Lucy” or the remake of John Woo’s “A Better Tomorrow.”

Other commentators have made similar observations. They cite the positive portrayal of China’s space program in both “Alfonso Cuaron’s “Gravity” and Christopher Nolan’s “Inception.” Another was 2012 MGM movie “Red Dawn,” in which CGI was used in post-production to change soldiers originally filmed as Chinese into North Korean.

The full report is published on crowdfunding platform Kickstarter.

[GeneChing]

...but I didn't foresee it happening this way.


It's Official: China Overtakes North America as World's Biggest Box Office in 2020 (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/its-official-china-overtakes-north-america-as-worlds-biggest-box-office-in-2020)
9:43 PM PDT 10/18/2020 by Patrick Brzeski

https://static.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/my-people-2-1-1601881811-928x523.jpg
Courtesy of Beijing Culture
'My People, My Homeland'


As the American entertainment industry ponders whether the pandemic has done permanent damage to moviegoing, China's theaters have returned to strong earnings.
China is officially home to the world's biggest movie box office.

Movie ticket sales in China for 2020 climbed to $1.988 billion on Sunday, surpassing North America's total of $1.937 billion, according to data from Artisan Gateway. The gap is expected to widen considerably by year's end.

Analysts have long predicted that the world's most populous country would one day top the global charts. But the results still represent a historic sea change: North America has been the global box office's center of gravity since the dawn of the motion picture business.

It only took a pandemic to accelerate the transition.

Thanks to China's effective containment of COVID-19, the country’s tens of thousands of theaters are operating at 75 percent of usual seating capacity, while filmgoers are demonstrating little hesitation about returning to the multiplex.

During the recent weeklong National Day holiday, running Oct. 1-8, China's cinemas sold $586 million worth of tickets. Local blockbuster My People, My Homeland brought in $19.1 million over just the past weekend, lifting its total earnings to $360 million after 18 days. China also has produced the world's biggest hit of 2020, WWII epic The Eight Hundred, with $460 million and counting. (Hollywood's biggest global earner this year is Sony's Bad Boys for Life at $426.5 million.)

The state of the North American box office, meanwhile, could scarcely be more dire. With theaters in many major markets still closed due to the United States' dangerously high COVID-19 infection rates, much of the industry's chatter has turned to the question of whether the damage done to the domestic theatrical film model might become permanent.

The major studios have postponed all of their biggest tentpole releases — such as Marvel's Black Widow and the James Bond film No Time to Die — until at least early 2021. AMC Theatres, North America's largest cinema chain, warned last week that it could run out of cash by the end of this year.

Liam Neeson's action flick Honest Thief, from Open Road, topped the North American box office over the past frame with just $3.7 million — results that were considered respectable given the state of cinemas.

Some industry insiders also worry that escalating political turmoil between Washington and Beijing could soon undercut Hollywood's longterm foothold in China, the one market where sales are again strong.

In the seemingly distant days of 2019, North America was still on top with combined annual tickets sales of $11.4 billion, with China trailing in second place at $9.2 billion. China's 2020 win comes with a COVID-19 asterisk — the question is whether the new order will prove permanent.

PATRICK BRZESKI
patrick.brzeski@thr.com
@thr


threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

...a weird 'I told you so' moment for me. When I first started my Chollywood Rising column, I imagined writing a final one and titled 'Chollywood Risen' but then I swapped the title for 'Fast Forward to the Fight Scenes.'

I may still write that essay someday. It's been a long and winding road.



Dec 24, 2020 8:30am PT
Local Movies Ruled the Asia Box Office in 2020. How Can Hollywood Catch Up? (https://variety.com/2020/film/asia/hollywood-asia-theatrical-streamers-2021-1234871601/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/the-man-standing-next_still01-showbox.jpg
Courtesy of Showbox
While the North American box office pulls in less than $5 million per weekend due to COVID-19, the China and Japan markets are not only open, but also capable of breaking theatrical records. It may feel logical to hurry more U.S. movies into Asian release, but when the real winners across the continent in 2020 have largely been local releases, studios and streamers will need to think long and hard about their strategy going forward.

Certainly, earning even a lowball $10 million from a theatrical release in China appears to be an attractive option at a time when Europe and the North American domestic markets are currently so dysfunctional. This was the route taken by Disney with “Mulan,” which went to premium VOD in Disney Plus territories and grossed a handy $42.2 million (RMB277 million) from Chinese theaters.

Kevin Spacey Shares Christmas Eve Video Dedicated to People Suffering in 2020: ‘It Gets Better’
Similarly, Universal has seen China cinemas deliver $49.9 million of the $85 million global theatrical cumulative to date on “The Croods: A New Age.” Meanwhile, Warner Bros.’ “Wonder Woman 1984” earned $18.8 million in three days in China where there is no HBO Max outing to undermine the exclusive theatrical window.

The logic of exploiting properties in Asia or licensing off individual titles applies to streamers as well as traditional studios. After all, none of the global OTT giants have complete networks in the region: Netflix doesn’t operate as a platform in mainland China, and Disney Plus will only roll out in Singapore in February and the world’s number four theatrical market South Korea some time later in 2021.

Elsewhere, Amazon Prime Video is patchier still in Asia — its major markets in the region are Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and India — reflecting the holes in the parent company’s Asian e-commerce network. WarnerMedia is targeting HBO Max rollouts in Latin America and Europe in 2021, but an Asia launch is still further over the horizon.

“The theory sounds simple enough. If you don’t have the D2C [direct-to-consumer] possibility in China, then you might want to license your content or exploit it another way. It recognizes the role of theatrical. But this is not an aggressive strategy [for any of the studios or global streamers] and may be an interim 2021 solution. Our view is that Disney is becoming flexible, not dogmatic, on windows,” says Vivek Couto, executive director at consultancy Media Partners Asia.

“After 2021, all bets that it would continue are off,” he adds.

To some extent, the global groups are prevented from rolling out their platforms any faster, as many of their content slates are currently committed to third-party regional streamers or pay-TV groups. That’s certainly the case for HBO Max in India, where HBO content is licensed to Disney-owned Hotstar, and in Australia, where shows are committed to News Corp-Telstra joint venture Foxtel. Meanwhile, Warners’ other VOD service, HBO Go, is now operational in eight Asian territories.

But another, more enduring problem is the long-term declining impact of Hollywood content as tastes in many Asian markets swing towards local fare — most notably in Korea, Japan and China — and the Hollywood studios’ numerous failed attempts to engineer global content with Asian roots.

The biggest successes at Asian box offices this year are resoundingly local. The top film in China is “The Eight Hundred” (gross $472 million), while “Demon Slayer the Movie: Mugen Train” has amassed $291 million in Japan, just shy of an all-time record. Box office in Taiwan, where cinemas did not close for COVID-19, has this year been dominated by “Demon Slayer” ($20.4 million) and Korean horror “Peninsula.” The top four films in Korea are all local, headed by the $37 million for “The Man Standing Next,” ahead of “Deliver Us From Evil” and “Peninsula.”

With the exception of the $530 million-grossing “The Meg,” Hollywood’s most recent attempts at rooting global fare in Asia haven’t had the broad appeal studios might have been hoping for. “Crazy Rich Asians” was global hit, but a dud in China. Legendary Entertainment’s Matt Damon-starring “The Great Wall” earned less than half of its $334 million total outside China.

China’s Pearl Studio, now free of its joint venture with Dreamworks Animation, hasn’t found the success it sought with its two most recent East-West hybrids. “Abominable” earned just $16 million of its $179 million global total in its home market. “Over The Moon” was seen as too westernized and earned RMB6 million, less than $1 million, before being turned over to Chinese streamers Tencent Video and iQIYI to exploit.

Those disappointments are now forcing the company into a change of tack. “Pearl is undergoing a transition in terms of its content strategy. In addition to animation films in English language aiming global audience, Pearl will also deploy resources to focus on Chinese-language animation movies for which China is the main market,” Catherine Ying, new president of Pearl Studio, president of CMC Pictures, and VP of CMC Inc., tells Variety.

“Pearl will collaborate more with local Chinese talent in the areas of story development and production [and establish] a closer working relationship with CMC Pictures.”

But if local content, rather than Hollywood superheroes and East-West hybrids, is what Asian audiences want, the studios and their soon-to-be expanded streaming offshoots are going to have to stock up on vastly more Asian content than they ever used to. That’s exactly what Disney did when launching Disney Plus Hotstar in Indonesia in September. It licensed some 300 titles and struck content supply deals with seven local studios.

“Disney Plus and Peacock will need local content in Asia,” says Couto. “Hollywood is becoming marginalized theatrically. Online it still works, but everyone has it.”

That points to a need for Asian local originals that work with local audiences and can help define a platform’s brand identity. But it’s not as though the studios haven’t tried.

Hollywood has repeatedly struggled to get local production in Asia right. Many initiatives have withered or been shut down. Columbia TriStar was an early pioneer in China at the beginning of the century. Since 2015, Disney has halted local production in China and pulled out in India, despite buying UTV, the largest local studio. The Disney-owned Fox Star Studios is similarly now a distributor, no longer a producer. Pre-Disney, Fox produced its first movie in Indonesia in 2018, but it stopped there. Warner quietly halted production in Korea this year, though it remains a distributor and financier of local film in Taiwan and Japan.

That retreat from Asian production stands in sharp contrast with the strategy at Netflix, which is going all in on production of drama originals in Korea (more than 50 to date), and anime in Japan, where it has supply contracts with seven local studios. Amazon, too, has a shelf full of comedy originals from Japan.

“We’ve seen this year that a great story can come from anywhere. We don’t believe that audiences are so concerned by original language. It’s about great story, then subbing and dubbing,” a Netflix spokesman in Asia tells Variety.

The company hasn’t produced shows in mainland China, but it has latched on to the country’s emerging sci-fi genre, picking up 2018 smash hit “The Wandering Earth.” In recent weeks, it licensed glossy fantasy “The Yin-Yang Master” ahead of its Dec. 25 local release. “With China, we are selective. We are looking at beloved classics and for elements that are relatable, transferable and universal, in genres that include culture, action, drama and fun,” the spokesman explains.

“Japanese anime is going big this year. That is a pleasant surprise to everybody. And it’s interesting to see that, with anime, a theatrical release doesn’t seem to diminish the value to our members.”

[GeneChing]

Will it hold? Probably. At least for a while...



China’s box office expands to world’s largest, defying a year of disastrous takings as Covid-19 brings cinemas to their knees (https://www.scmp.com/business/companies/article/3116128/chinas-box-office-expands-worlds-largest-defying-year-disastrous)
Movie ticket sales in China stood at US$3.06 billion last year, 69 per cent lower than the record high of US$9.8 billion in 2019
War epic ‘The Eight Hundred’ becomes the first Chinese blockbuster to top the global box office charts
Enoch Yiu
Published: 7:29pm, 1 Jan, 2021

https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1098,format=auto/sites/default/files/styles/1200x800/public/d8/images/methode/2021/01/01/8e1c6916-4c01-11eb-9c55-93e83087d811_image_hires_203443.jpg?itok=TjX-rsRe&v=1609504494
Cinemas in China were closed for 178 days between January and late July last year as authorities on the mainland took stringent measures to bring the Covid-19 pandemic under control. Photo: Shutterstock Images
China overtook the US as the world’s biggest box office market for the first time last year but revenues fell sharply as the mainland’s control of the Covid-19 pandemic helped to bring film-goers back to the cinemas even as the entertainment industry in the rest of the world endures a slump.
Movie ticket sales in China stood at 20 billion yuan (US$3.06 billion) in 2020, much higher than the US$2.28 billion takings in the US, according to data from China’s Maoyan Entertainment and Comscore of the US.
Ticketing revenue in China, however, plummeted 69 per cent from the all-time high of 64.27 billion yuan (US$9.8 billion) in 2019. And in the US, ticket sales sank 80 per cent from the second-best box office haul ever of US$11.4 billion in 2019.
It was also the first time a Chinese film outdid a Hollywood blockbuster to top the global box office takings.
https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/methode/2021/01/01/ba0c178c-4c20-11eb-9c55-93e83087d811_1320x770_203443.jpgt
A still from the war epic The Eight Hundred, which made US$461.34 million in ticket sales. Photo: Handout
The Eight Hundred, a war epic about 800 Chinese soldiers fighting against the Japanese army in Shanghai in 1937, raked in US$461.34 million, pipping Bad Boy for Life – a Hollywood movie about Miami detectives – which came second with US$426.5 million in ticket sales, according to data from Box Office Mojo. Bad Boy for Life was released last January before the pandemic forced the closure of cinemas worldwide.
The Eight Hundred was the first Chinese blockbuster to hit the cinemas in August after the coronavirus outbreak in January led to the closure of all theatres in the mainland for 178 days until July 20. At present, most cinemas in China are open while thousands in the US remain shut due to rising infections.
“China’s economy started to recover from July after restrictions on social gatherings were eased, including going to the movies,” said Louis Tse Ming-kwong, managing director of brokerage Wealthy Securities. “Even though China has allowed people to resume domestic travelling, it is cumbersome to travel far from home due to heavy traffic, the need to book hotels, etc. Hence, people prefer social activities, such as going to the cinemas close to their homes.”
Tse is upbeat on China’s box office outlook this year, but was quick to add that the “quality of movies is important to attract film-goers to go to the cinemas”.
Many Hollywood studios have postponed their biggest releases from 2020 to early 2021, such as Tom Cruise’s Top Gun: Maverick; the James Bond film No Time to Die as well as Marvel’s Black Widow. That paved the way for Chinese films to top the global box office charts.
At number three was another Chinese flick, My People, My Homeland, which made US$422.38 million. Released during China’s “golden week” national holiday in October, it sold more tickets than the Hollywood science fiction action-thriller Tenet. The Christopher Nolan-helmed film ranked fourth at US$362.42 million.
The release of the latest James Bond film No Time To Die has been postponed to April because of Covid-19. Photo: Handout
The release of the latest James Bond film No Time To Die has been postponed to April because of Covid-19. Photo: Handout
While Chinese films make most of their revenues at home, Hollywood films have a wider appeal. Bad Boy for Life and Tenet made more than half of their ticket sales outside the US.
“China can become the largest movie market worldwide permanently due to its large population and strong economic growth,” said Joseph Tong Tang, chairman of Morton Securities in Hong Kong.
“As China overtakes the US as the world’s largest economy in a few years’ time, the movie market is only reflecting what is yet to come,” Tang said.

[GeneChing]

Bleak outlook for Hong Kong film industry as Covid-19 keeps cinemas shut and fewer movies are made (https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/article/3118963/bleak-outlook-hong-kong-film-industry-covid-19)
Box office takings fell 72 per cent to HK$537 million last year, as cinemas closed for 116 days
Glimmer of hope in producing films for mainland Chinese audiences, say industry veterans
Cannix Yau
Published: 3:30pm, 23 Jan, 2021

https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1098,format=auto/sites/default/files/styles/1200x800/public/d8/images/methode/2021/01/23/ae1ddf9c-5d1d-11eb-a99a-beae699a1a1d_image_hires_150949.jpeg?itok=YJAkVR7y&v=1611385808
Cinemas in Hong Kong have been forced to close under social-distancing rules enacted to control the coronavirus pandemic. Photo: Edmond So
Hong Kong’s once-glittering movie industry has lost its shine, hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic which closed cinemas, shrank box office takings and resulted in fewer films made last year.
Industry players expecting another bleak year ahead say the only hope now is to make films that appeal to mainland Chinese audiences.
“This year will be miserable for domestic films if they only focus on the local market. Losses are inevitable,” said Crucindo Hung Cho-sing, chairman of the Hong Kong Motion Picture Industry Association.
The city’s cinemas saw their takings plunge by 72 per cent to HK$537 million (US$69.27 million) last year, from HK$1.92 billion in 2019, according to Hong Kong Box Office Ltd.https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/methode/2021/01/23/aff33452-5d1d-11eb-a99a-beae699a1a1d_1320x770_150949.jpeg
Cinemas showed fewer movies last year, with the total falling by a third to 218, from 319 in 2019. Photo: Warton Li
With each wave of Covid-19 infections, the government ordered cinemas to close three times for varying periods last year, keeping them shut for a total of 116 days. Cinemas remain closed under current restrictions.
Fewer new films opened last year too. The total fell by a third to 218, from 319 in 2019, with only 34 Hong Kong productions, down from 49 the year before.
Tenet, a Hollywood science fiction action-thriller, was last year’s highest-grossing title, taking HK$54.9 million at the box office. Among Hong Kong films, kung fu comedy The Grand Grandmaster performed best, grossing HK$29.5 million, followed by low-budget mystery-romance Beyond The Dream, which earned about HK$15.3 million.
A scene from the kung fu comedy ‘The Grand Grandmaster’. Photo: Handout (https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/methode/2021/01/23/b215675a-5d1d-11eb-a99a-beae699a1a1d_1320x770_150949.jpeg)
A scene from the kung fu comedy ‘The Grand Grandmaster’. Photo: Handout
No longer ‘Hollywood of the East’
In its heyday in the 1980s and early 1990s, when Hong Kong was dubbed the Hollywood of the East, more than 200 films were churned out every year and the city was the world’s second-biggest movie exporter.
Those days are gone, and Hung said the Chinese market was now the only way out for local filmmakers, especially through co-productions that can be distributed as domestic films in Chinese cities.
“It is impossible for local titles to make money in Hong Kong. They have to rely on the Chinese market for survival,” he said.
Cinema attendances on the mainland bounced back through the second half of last year as it brought its Covid-19 outbreak under control.
Over the recent three-day New Year holiday, mainland cinemas raked in a record 1.29 billion yuan (US$199 million), surpassing the previous record of 1.27 billion yuan for the same period in 2018.
Two mainland films were the top performers on New Year’s Day. A Little Red Flower, about two families and their battle against cancer, grossed 246 million yuan, while the comedy Warm Hug made more than 160 million yuan. Hong Kong action film The Shock Wave 2 starring Andy Lau came third with 92.92 million yuan.
Hung pointed to the mainland’s 1.4 billion people in emphasising the potential there for Hong Kong movie makers.
“The mainland’s movie market is very strange and unpredictable,” he said. “Even a low-budget film on some offbeat topic can become a big hit. So the China market has become the dream factory for filmmakers to flex their muscles.”
Hung said local filmmakers keen to roll out low-budget productions could look to the Greater Bay Area, which comprised Hong Kong, Macau and nine cities in Guangdong that Beijing aimed to turn into a technological and economic powerhouse.
A host of measures exist to help the city’s filmmakers tap the bay area, with various restrictions on issues including the key creative personnel, cast and plots being eased.
Veteran filmmaker John Chong Ching, who produced famous Hong Kong films such as the Infernal Affairs trilogy, agreed with Hung and said Covid-19 has had only a minor impact on big-budget co-productions released on the mainland.

For co-productions, Hong Kong filmmakers face the challenge of having limited creative freedom
Jimmy Pang. culture critic
“Hong Kong cinemas have become the biggest casualty as they have been forced to shut on-and-off for a long time last year, causing a lot of delays to many movie screenings,” he said.
“But for co-productions which rely on the market for generating at least 70 per cent of their revenue, many moviemakers have been actively rolling out projects and preparing pre-production work.”
However, Chong said there was a formula for success, and Hong Kong co-productions that did well on the mainland were usually crime-related action thrillers rather than romance or art house films.
Prominent culture critic Jimmy Pang Chi-ming doubted that Hong Kong-mainland co-productions were the way to go, saying the mainland authorities still had a lot of restrictions that affected the creativity of filmmakers.
Last year, for example, they tightened censorship of movie content, extending bans on plots centred on ghosts, gay love and time travel, and indicated that romance films should avoid being “overly sweet”.
“For co-productions, Hong Kong filmmakers face the challenge of having limited creative freedom which easily compromises their film’s quality,” he said.https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/methode/2021/01/23/b7864952-5d1d-11eb-a99a-beae699a1a1d_1320x770_150949.JPG
A scene from the Hong Kong action film ‘The Shock Wave 2’, starring Andy Lau. Photo: Handout
‘Hard to shoot street scenes now’
To support the stricken industry, the Hong Kong government earmarked about HK$260 million last year under the Film Development Fund to increase the number of local productions, nurture young directors and scriptwriting talent and provide more training opportunities.
In three rounds of the HK$300-billion Anti-epidemic Fund, the government also provided one-off subsidies to cinemas ranging from HK$50,000 to HK$100,000 per screen in each tranche.
Since early last year, about 30 local productions have been completed or are being filmed, including eight subsidised by different schemes under the Film Development Fund.
Veteran producer and actor Tenky Tin Kai-man, chairman of the Federation of Hong Kong Filmmakers, said the city’s movie industry remained mired in uncertainty because of the pandemic.
“Before a new film is released, the movie company needs to spend HK$300,000 to more than HK$1 million on promotion and advertising. Last year, many releases were disrupted by the sudden closure of cinemas and a lot of money went down the drain,” he said.
Plans were made for the Andy Lau movie The Shock Wave 2 to open in Hong Kong at Christmas, he said, but the city’s cinemas were ordered closed in early December.
“We have no idea when cinemas can reopen,” he said.
The pandemic has also affected moviemaking in the city. “It is difficult for filmmakers to shoot street scenes in Hong Kong as the pedestrians are all wearing masks. Uncertain factors like these have turned off film investors,” he said.
Tin said he has been actively lobbying investors to bankroll more projects as many frontline production workers have been out of job for a long time. Hong Kong’s culture industries, which includes film production, employed 217,280 people, or 5.6 per cent of the city’s total workforce in 2018.
“Amid all this pessimism, I believe there’s a great demand for feel-good, happy films which promote positive energy,” he said.
Tin admitted that the trend of streaming films online via media platforms such as Netflix, iQiyi.com and Tencent Video, had also posed a challenge to filmmakers.
“Film investors need to rethink how to adjust film distribution to make sure they can still make money from this trend and at the same time attract cinema-goers too,” he said.

Seems like forever since I wrote for Hong Kong Film magazine.

[GeneChing]

It's hard to make these claims while the pandemic is still going.


What if China no longer needs Hollywood? That's bad news for the film industry (https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/28/media/china-box-office-coronavirus/index.html)
By Frank Pallotta, CNN Business

Updated 12:49 PM ET, Thu January 28, 2021

In 2020, China overtook the United States to become the top movie market in the world. The country, perennially the second-largest movie market, brought in $3.1 billion at the box office in 2020, according to Comscore (SCOR) — nearly $1 billion more than the United States did last year.
Now, obviously, there's a glaring asterisk here: coronavirus. China bounced back much faster than the United States did following the initial outbreak in the country. That led to theaters opening sooner than those in the United States, which still has many of its theaters closed.
Caveats aside, some major Hollywood films just didn't catch on with Chinese audiences in 2020. Warner Bros.' "Wonder Woman 1984" didn't do well there, and Disney's "Mulan" — a movie aimed at Chinese audiences — was a big disappointment. This comes after years of Hollywood globalizing their blockbusters in hopes that they connect with American and international audiences, like those in China.
So what if China no longer needs Hollywood?

A Hollywood without China?

"If China doesn't need US movies, Hollywood studios will have to dramatically reduce their spending on big budget blockbusters," Aynne Kokas, the author of "Hollywood Made in China," told CNN Business. "The current budgets are unsustainable without access to the China market. That could fundamentally change the model of the US film industry."
Kokas, an associate professor of media studies at the University of Virginia, explained that to sell films to the Chinese audience, US studios have cast "Chinese stars and adjusted content to serve the Mainland Chinese market."
Recent examples are removing the Taiwan flag on Tom Cruise's jacket in the upcoming "Top Gun: Maverick" and "the retelling of 'Doctor Strange' so that a lead character is Celtic rather than Tibetan," she said. China considers self-ruled Taiwan a breakaway province and maintains a tight grip on Tibet, where the US government says ethnic Tibetans' religious freedom has been severely restricted.
Kokas said that "unless the US gets Covid under control and theaters open, Hollywood will become increasingly dependent on China."
"Regardless of what happens with Covid, we have at a minimum entered a world where the Chinese and US box offices are equally important," she added.
AMC&#39;s CEO believes his movie theaters will survive through 2021
AMC's CEO believes his movie theaters will survive through 2021
While Hollywood movies have stumbled in China lately, some films produced by Chinese studios and production companies have flourished.
China released a blockbuster of its own in August called "The Eight Hundred." The action war film from China's CMC Pictures grossed more than $100 million in the country on its opening weekend and made more than $400 million worldwide.
Shawn Robbins, chief analyst at Boxoffice.com, told CNN Business that it's telling that the Chinese box office rebounded in 2020 mostly due to their handling of the pandemic's impact as well as "the volume of strong, in-demand local content."
"There is a clear strength in China's market that allows them to not rely exclusively on Hollywood products," he said. "That's an internal advantage of their industry."
Hollywood's problems in China could also be related to rising geopolitical tensions with the US itself. Coronavirus caused a rift between the US and China that has lead to a surge of nationalism in the country and anti-foreign sentiment, which is often stirred by China's state media.

The two pillars of the global box office

2020 was a year that changed the pecking order at the global box office, but Hollywood shouldn't ring the alarm bells just yet. The appeal of many American brands among Chinese audiences "probably hasn't waned significantly," Robbins points out.
"While we've seen mixed results from Hollywood titles opening there during the pandemic, let's also remember the sample size is quite small and doesn't necessarily reflect what happened before the pandemic and likely what could happen after," he added.
Robbins said that "Wonder Woman 1984" was a misfire in China for several reasons, including that "its predecessor itself wasn't nearly the runaway blockbuster in that country that it was in other parts of the world."
He also added that the controversies surrounding "Mulan" before its release likely didn't help its success in the country, either. And Chinese audiences weren't arguably big fans of the original 1998 animated version of the film because of how the US and Disney retold and westernized the original legend.
But franchises like Marvel, Fast & Furious, and other Disney titles have been "among the reliable imports China's market banks on," he said.
"It's hard to see that changing dramatically in the short term once the world begins to recover from the pandemic later in 2021 — especially when considering nearly half of 2019's top grossing films in the Middle Kingdom were Hollywood-made."
So where do Hollywood and China go from here? That question, like so many in the film industry right now, has no easy answer. Yet whatever the future of the film industry is, it's likely to be one where Hollywood and China remain the two major pillars holding up the global box office.
"Ultimately, though, the global box office landscape depends greatly on what these two giants can achieve in the years going forward," Robbins said.

[GeneChing]

Chinese New Year Box Office Hits $1.2B, Sets Record High Over Holiday Period (https://deadline.com/2021/02/chinese-new-year-2021-box-office-record-detective-chinatown-3-hi-mom-covid-1234695261/)

By Nancy Tartaglione
International Box Office Editor/Senior Contributor
@DeadlineNancy

February 17, 2021 12:40pm

https://deadline.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/detective-chinatown-3-1.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
Wanda Pictures
The Chinese New Year box office achieved yet another milestone Wednesday, with grosses for the holiday period growing to an estimated RMB 7.78 billion ($1.2 billion). This beats the previous all-time high set during the comparable 2019 holiday (RMB 5.9B). China often outdoes itself, but the fact that 2021’s Lunar New Year frame came with Covid capacity restrictions makes the performance even more staggering.

Factors working in the session’s favor included a diverse slate of seven new local titles (including two powerhouses at the top), as well as increased ticket prices in some areas, additional screens versus 2019 and a reduction in travel which made moviegoing the first-choice activity for people who were not journeying to see family as would normally be the case during the holiday.

After setting new records for opening day and opening weekend in a single market (February 12-14), Wanda Pictures’ Detective Chinatown 3 has grossed RMB 3.56B ($551 million) through Wednesday. It is not only far and away the top movie of the year globally, but is also nearly 20% bigger than 2020’s top worldwide title, China’s The Eight Hundred — and this after just six days of play, with more to come.

While DC3 led the weekend, Beijing Culture’s time-travel comedy Hi, Mom was atop the daily charts from Monday-Wednesday and has grossed RMB 2.73B ($423M). Hi, Mom is projected by Maoyan to top out at RMB 5.28 ($817M), which would make it the No. 2 movie ever in the market. DC3 is eyeing RMB 4.51B ($698M), estimates Maoyan, a 33% local currency increase on the previous installment in the popular franchise.

Overall, there were seven new local movies for the New Year session which rolled out beginning February 12; the public holiday in China ran from February 11-17, though celebrations continue. Through Wednesday, the titles above are rounded out by A Writer’s Odyssey (RMB 538.2/$83.32M), Boonie Bears: The Wild Life (RMB 407M/$63M), New Gods: Nezha Reborn (RMB240.1M/$37.2M), The Yin Yang Master (RMB 211M/$33M) and Endgame (151M/$23.4M).

Xinhua reports that more than 155 million tickets were sold during the New Year frame, up from 130M in 2019. That’s reflective of pent-up demand for big new titles — especially given Detective Chinatown 3 was delayed by a year when Covid shuttered cinemas in early 2020 — and in part reflective of the increased number of screens in the market, which was 75,500 by the end of 2020, compared to just under 70,000 at the end of 2019.

China was the first country severely hit by the coronavirus, and implemented strict lockdown measures across the board. After six months of cinema closures, it slowly re-acclimated audiences. That began in July 2020 with some import titles whose releases had been delayed by Covid (think: Dolittle) and library movies like the first Harry Potter and some older Christopher Nolan pics. Once the market was primed, China released The Eight Hundred to huge results last August. Notes an international exec, “What China is showing is that where the virus is under control and people feel safe, they’re coming back (to cinemas) in droves.” We’ve seen some similar phenomena in Korea and Japan, although with more Covid ebbs and flows affecting momentum.

The early estimated RMB 7.78B Chinese New Year period (which also includes holdover play from movies like Disney-Pixar’s Soul), is already 38% of the total box office for 2020 in China. It’s also about 10% of 2020 global box office, 12% of international box office and 55% of domestic box office last year.

For the first month and a half of 2021, China box office has crossed RMB 10B, according to state news media, meaning it’s already more than 50% of 2020’s full gross. The good news out of China hopefully serves as an indicator of recovery that will be seen in other markets as they get back up and running with new product.

threads
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Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

China’s Lunar New Year box office revenues soar by a third to record US$1.21 billion as cinemas fill up amid travel restrictions (https://www.scmp.com/business/money/spending/article/3122812/chinas-lunar-new-year-box-office-revenues-soar-third-record)
Strict measures to avoid a return of Covid-19 meant more people stayed put during the festival season instead of returning to their hometowns for family reunions
Ticket sales were dominated by the comedies Hi, Mom and Detective Chinatown 3, which became the fifth and sixth top-grossing movies of all time in the Chinese film market

Cheryl Heng
Published: 6:44pm, 23 Feb, 2021

https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1098,format=auto/sites/default/files/styles/1200x800/public/d8/images/methode/2021/02/23/0bd127be-75bc-11eb-8b9d-76c80a88a6d4_image_hires_195736.jpg?itok=0-58x3V3&v=1614081469
People queue to enter a cinema in Beijing on February 17, 2021. Photo: Xinhua
China’s box office revenues climbed to a record high during the week-long Lunar New Year holiday, signalling a promising recovery of the world’s largest film market from the coronavirus fallout last year.
Holiday movie ticket sales in China reached 7.8 billion yuan (US$1.21 billion) during the week of February 11 to 17, up 32.5 per cent from the 2019 Lunar New Year holiday, according to Chinese ticketing platform Maoyan Entertainment.
Ticketing revenue for 2020 was omitted as cinemas were shut between January and July amid the coronavirus crisis.
The resurgence at the box office may have been powered by stricter travel measures put in place to limit the annual Lunar New Year mass migration, in a bid to prevent a return of Covid-19. People stayed put during the festival season instead of returning to their hometowns for family reunions.
Some 44 per cent of those surveyed by the Maoyan Research Institute said they watched more movies during this year’s festive season than they did in 2019, citing more leisure time as their main reason.
More than 40 per cent of theatre screenings were fully booked in the first three days of the festive season.
Box office sales in the period were dominated by family comedy Hi, Mom and mystery comedy Detective Chinatown 3. The films had raked in earnings of 4.24 billion yuan and 4.1 billion yuan respectively as of Tuesday, making them the fifth and sixth top-grossing movies of all time in the Chinese film market, a whisker behind Avengers 4: Endgame at 4.25 billion yuan, Maoyan data showed.
Detective Chinatown 3, the third instalment of the popular cop series, led China’s box office in the first few days of the holiday with its strong franchise appeal and marketing buzz.
But it was inched out of first place by the strong word-of-mouth appeal of comedian Jia Ling’s maiden directorial work, Hi, Mom, a heartwarming story of a daughter who travels back in time to meet her mother.
The first six days of the Lunar New Year emerged as being among the top 10 highest box office revenue days in China’s film history, even as most theatres were limited to three-quarters seating capacity.
China took the top spot for global cinema receipts last year, overtaking the US as the pandemic shut American cinemas for longer than their Chinese counterparts. Ticket sales in China came to 20 billion yuan (US$3.06 billion) in 2020, surpassing the US$2.28 billion of receipts in the US, according to data from Maoyan and Comscore.

threads
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2021 Year of the Ox (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71967-2021-Year-of-the-Ox)
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

Ticking Debt Bomb in China’s $18.1 Trillion Bond Market (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-15/china-tycoon-who-lost-32-billion-tries-to-salvage-his-empire)
Business
China Tycoon Who Lost $32 Billion Tries to Salvage an Empire
By Shirley Zhao, Venus Feng, and Rebecca Choong Wilkins
March 15, 2021, 12:00 PM PDT Updated on March 16, 2021, 2:31 AM PDT
Wanda Group’s cinemas, malls hit by pandemic as debt ballooned
Founder Wang Jianlin’s wealth is now a sliver of its 2015 peak


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Wang Jianlin used to be Asia’s richest person, busy expanding his Dalian Wanda Group Co. by acquiring trophy assets overseas, all aided by easy credit.

Now the 66-year-old doesn’t even figure among China’s top 30 richest people, having lost about $32 billion of his personal fortune in less than six years -- the most for any tycoon in that period. As Wang seeks to cut the group’s total debt from 362 billion yuan ($56 billion) and turn his entertainment-to-property empire around, he’s facing skeptical bond investors.

Braced for a wall of maturing onshore notes peaking this year, some of Wanda’s dollar bonds were among the first to tumble earlier this month, when a broader decline hit the Asian credit market. The selloff, partly triggered by concerns over the looming payments, came as a warning from investors eager to see how Wang will manage to steer his group clear of the debt risks that convulsed peers such as HNA Group Co., China Evergrande Group and Anbang Group Holdings Co.

“The group’s liquidity is a key consideration for investors,” said Dan Wang, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. A representative for Wanda didn’t respond to requests for comment on the debt risks.

Wanda’s Wang, who once purchased Spanish soccer club Atletico Madrid as part of the binge-buying and aspired to compete with Walt Disney Co., is still shedding some of those assets. The latest came last week, when Wanda gave up control of AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc., with its stake now representing less than 10% of the world’s largest movie-theater chain. Its chief executive officer said the company would be governed by a wide group of shareholders, and the stock has surged more than 42% in the past three days.

Despite the disposals following a government crackdown on credit-fueled expansion, Wanda Group’s debt as of June ballooned to the highest since 2017. The pandemic has only added to the woes, dealing a blow to its cinemas, malls, theme parks, hotels and sports events.

Three Pillars
Malls and hotels accounted for almost half of Wanda's 2019 revenue


Source: Wanda Group

Note: Graphic excludes 7.5 billion yuan in losses from Wanda's other investment activities

As China stabilizes its economy after containing the virus, the reopening of movie theaters and malls is providing Wang the much-needed time to steady his ship. He’s pressing ahead with a strategy he’s advocated for years, called the “asset-light” model, to reduce leverage.

That means spending less by cutting back on land purchases. Dalian Wanda Commercial Management Group Co., one of the world’s biggest mall operators that accounts for almost half of the group’s revenue, will stop buying plots starting this year and license its brand to partners instead, the company’s President Xiao Guangrui told mainland media in September.

No Alternative
“Wanda had no real alternative to its new asset-light strategy,” said Brock Silvers, chief investment officer at Kaiyuan Capital in Hong Kong, who doesn’t hold any Wanda unit shares or bonds. “The company’s debts were unsustainable.”

The effect of the pandemic on Wanda has been astounding.

Movie producer and cinema operator Wanda Film Holding Co. said it may have racked up a record $1 billion in net loss last year. Despite becoming a favorite in the recent Reddit-fueled share rally, AMC warned several times it was near the brink of insolvency and reported its worst-ever annual loss as revenue plunged 77%. Wanda Commercial Management said sales and profit fell nearly 50% in the first nine months of 2020, while Wanda Sports Group Co.’s American depositary receipts were delisted in January after losing more than two-thirds of their value since they began trading in July 2019.

https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/iNPH44Q6BNRs/v0/1400x-1.jpg
A closed AMC movie theater in Tucson, Arizona, in June 2020.Photographer: Cheney Orr/Bloomberg
Even if Wanda’s businesses tide over the global health crisis, there’s no certainty creditors will be kind after the developments at other indebted Chinese conglomerates such as HNA, Evergrande and lately at Suning Appliance Group Co.

In an offering circular in September, Wanda told investors that the group’s level of indebtedness may “adversely affect” some operations. The conglomerate is also facing tighter credit rules in the real estate sector as Chinese regulators look to curb financial risk.

Wanda and its units raised about 48.2 billion yuan in local and offshore debt last year, the most since 2016. A part of it was used to pay older obligations as the group needs to refinance or repay about 32 billion yuan of domestic bonds due in 2021.

While the group’s dollar bonds have almost erased their losses since tumbling earlier this month -- their worst week in almost a year -- credit traders cited concerns over the group’s maturing local bonds and a selloff in some of its onshore notes.

Wanda Commercial Management’s debt is rated non-investment grade by Fitch Ratings, S&P Global Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service.

The Good, Bad and the Offloaded
Businesses are still bouncing back from lockdowns


Sources: Filings, Wanda Group, Bloomberg

In his heyday, Wang -- a former People’s Liberation Army soldier -- jetted around in his Gulfstream G550 private plane, paying top prices for assets including a luxury property in Beverly Hills, Hollywood studio Legendary Entertainment and One Nine Elms in London, one of Europe’s tallest residential towers.

His fortune took a dive as China started to crack down on such expansion and capital outflows. His wealth has shrunk to about $14 billion from a peak of $46 billion in 2015, when he was crowned Asia’s richest person, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

“Wanda gained surprisingly little from its period of unconstrained investment opportunity,” said Kaiyuan Capital’s Silvers. “The company has since been quicker to shed assets than other conglomerates, but it still has far to go.”

The asset-light strategy would help generate sustainable recurring rental income for Wanda Commercial Management, the “cash cow” of the group, said Chloe He, corporate-rating director at Fitch. It can also prevent the company from committing heavy capital expenditure and taking on too much debt, she added.

“This is going to be very helpful for them to deleverage in the future, provided they don’t invest in something else,” He said.


— With assistance by Emma Dong, Evelyn Yu, Adrian Yim, and Jack Witzig

threads
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[GeneChing]

Mar 15, 2021 11:21am PT
Alibaba May Be Forced to Sell Media Businesses by Chinese Government (Report) (https://variety.com/2021/biz/asia/alibaba-china-forced-sell-media-businesses-1234931004/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Alibaba-logo-768x432-1.png
Alibaba Group
The Chinese government may order e-commerce to entertainment giant Alibaba to sell off or cut back its vast array of media assets. In addition to the company’s too-big-to fail status derived from activities that range from food retailing to electronic payments, China’s government has reportedly become concerned about Alibaba’s ability to influence public opinion.

After government regulators drew up an inventory of the group’s media assets earlier this year, they have begun negotiations with Alibaba that may lead to disposal of some of its media businesses, according to a Wall Street Journal report citing anonymous sources.

Alibaba’s media and entertainment portfolio is huge and diverse, though it is almost entirely focused on Greater China. The businesses range from print publishing to video streaming, and include minority stakes in social media firms, cinemas and film production companies.

One of its most prominent overseas jewels is a minority stake of unknown size in Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Partners, bought in late 2016. Another is its majority stake in the South China Morning Post, Hong Kong’s leading English-language newspaper publisher, bought earlier the same year.

In response to the report, Alibaba said in a statement: “The purpose of our investments in these companies is to provide technology support for their business upgrade and drive commercial synergies with our core commerce businesses. We do not intervene or get involved in the companies’ day-to-day operations or editorial decisions.”

The vast majority of media in China is owned or controlled by the state at some level. That allows central authorities to direct news flow, emphasize favored topics, demonize enemies and exclude information and opinion that does not support Communist Party messaging.

Social media, with its diversity and speed, is increasingly being seen as a challenge to the China government’s ability to speak with one voice. Over the years, social platforms have been required to do the government’s bidding by employing ever increasing number of staff to censor user comments and user-generated content.

Despite companies’ compliance, Chinese authorities have also spent several months devising ways to rein in the country’s tech giants. Financial regulatory authorities halted the spinoff and IPO of Alibaba’s financial arm, Ant Group, in late 2020. They have also used the State Authority for Market Regulation to punish tech firms for unauthorized merger and acquisition activity, and in late December Alibaba was given formal notification of an investigation into alleged monopolistic behavior.

Among Alibaba’s core media and entertainment businesses is Youku Tudou, one of China’s largest generalist video streaming firms. Its Alibaba Pictures unit, which has a separate share listing in Hong Kong, contains film production and distribution businesses as well as Tao Piao Piao, one of two companies that dominate cinema ticketing.

Alibaba also amassed minority stakes in publisher Yicai Media (37%), video streamer Mango TV (5%), Twitter-like social media platform Weibo (30%), video entertainment group Bilibili (6.7%) and Focus Media (5.3%), China’s top online advertising network.

It also has stakes in film studios Huayi Bros. Media, Bona Film Group, film financier Hehe Pictures and exhibition chains Dadi Cinemas and Wanda Pictures. Those investments have often appeared to be at the behest of Chinese authorities as a means of using Alibaba’s massive financial strength to shore up the country’s entertainment sector, which is huge but remains in its industrial infancy.

Alibaba shares are listed in ARD form on the New York Stock Exchange. The company has a secondary listing in Hong Kong. The conglomerate’s market capitalization was around $620 billion on Monday.


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[GeneChing]

China Box Office: 'Godzilla vs. Kong' Roars With $21.5M Friday (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-box-office-godzilla-vs-kong-roars-with-20m-friday)
6:34 AM PDT 3/26/2021 by Patrick Brzeski
https://static.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/rev-1-GVK-v010016_R5_High_Res_JPEG-H-2021-1616104220-928x523.jpg
Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

The monster sequel is pacing slightly ahead of its predecessor 'Godzilla: King of the Monsters,' which earned $20.9 million on its first day in 2019, before finishing the weekend with $70.6 million.
Warner Bros. and Legendary Entertainment's Godzilla vs. Kong is off to a stomping start at China's huge theatrical box office.

The Adam Wingard-directed monster sequel pulled in $21.5 million Friday, according to Legendary. The new film is pacing slightly ahead of its predecessor Godzilla: King of the Monsters, which Artisan Gateway data shows earned $20.9 million on its first day in 2019, before finishing the weekend with $70.6 million.

Local word of mouth for Godzilla vs. Kong is currently looking strong, with the film scoring 9/10 on ticketing apps Maoyan and Taopiaopiao, and 7.1 on reviews site Douban — solid numbers for a Hollywood tentpole. Based on current demand, Maoyan projects GVK to finish its run with approximately $166 million (the ticketing company's early forecasts are often revised considerably, however).

The monster tentpole's biggest competition this weekend in China is the holdover Chinese New Year blockbuster Hi, Mom and James Cameron's rereleased Avatar. But GVK is easily dominating both screen share and earnings, taking 87.6 percent of Friday's total ticket sales so far, according to Maoyan, compared to about 2.8 percent a piece for Avatar and Hi, Mom.

It's already abundantly clear, though, that the China market alone will give GVK claim to the biggest international theatrical debut of the pandemic era. Christopher Nolan's Tenet previously had the biggest offshore start of the past year with $53 million. Tenet finished its run in China with a respectable but unspectacular $66.9 million.

In addition to China, GVK is opening in 38 other offshore markets this week, including sizable territories South Korea, Australia, Russia, Mexico, Taiwan, Indonesia and India, among others (the film doesn't open in Japan, home of Godzilla, until May).

GVK is launching abroad ahead of its North American release, which will arrive day-and-date in theaters and on HBO Max on March 31.

As advertised, GVK stars Godzilla and King Kong, with some supporting appearances by Alexander Skarsgard, Millie Bobby Brown, Rebecca Hall, Brian Tyree Henry, Shun Oguri, Kyle Chandler, Demian Bichir and others.

The film is a co-production of Warners and Legendary. The latter, which is owned by Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group (which also owns China's biggest movie theater circuit), is marketing and distributing GVK directly in China, with Warners handling the rest of the world.

More to come.

PATRICK BRZESKI
patrick.brzeski@thr.com
@thr


threads
Godzilla-vs-Kong (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71975-Godzilla-vs-Kong)
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

For Americans claiming censorship and media bias, ours is a capitalist economy so it is driven by private enterprise money, not the government. The PRC is communist so it is more likely government. But in all honesty, if I truly understood what was going on, I'd be an international market analyst making big bucks, not a martial arts writer posting on this forum here. :o


Wang Zhongjun Steps Down as Chairman of Huayi Tencent Entertainment (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/wang-zhongjun-steps-down-as-chairman-of-huayi-tencent-entertainment)
10:09 PM PDT 3/28/2021 by Patrick Brzeski
https://static.hollywoodreporter.com/sites/default/files/2016/10/gettyimages-102884260-h_2016-928x523.jpg
China Photos/Getty Images

The Hong Kong-based holding company has been used by Huayi Brothers, Tencent and other investors to make offshore investments into international films, such as the Russo brothers' 'Cherry' and Roland Emmerich's upcoming 'Moonfall.'
Chinese movie mogul Wang Zhongjun, co-founder of Huayi Brothers Media, has stepped down as chairman of holding company Huayi Tencent Entertainment.

Established in 2016, the firm, which is listed on the Hong Kong stock exchange, has been used by Huayi Brothers, Tencent and its other investors as a vehicle to co-finance international films and buy stakes in companies listed outside China. The joint venture was established when its backers took over a Hong Kong-listed shell company that was formerly a retirement home developer in Hong Kong.

Huayi Tencent's recent investments include the South Korean sci-fi film Space Sweepers, the Russo brothers' crime drama Cherry and Roland Emmerich's forthcoming sci-fi action film Moonfall. The firm also owns a 31 percent stake in South Korean TV drama producer HB Entertainment.

Huayi Tencent said in a statement Friday that Wang was resigning "as he needs to devote more time to his other business engagements," and that his exit would be effective March 30.

Huayi Brothers Media, which Wang founded with his younger brother Wang Zhonglei in the 1990s, was previously the largest stakeholder in Huayi Tencent, but the Beijing-based parent company offloaded 13.17 percent of its shares last November, dropping its stake to just 5 percent. The sales were part of an ongoing retrenchment of the brothers' longstanding entertainment empire, which was battered by bad press following a tax evasion scandal that swept the Chinese industry in 2018. The company got a $100 million lifeline from Jack Ma's Alibaba in 2019, and began to see its fortunes recover last year with the $460 million success of its WWII tentpole The Eight Hundred.

Wang's exit from the Hong Kong-listed holding firm comes at a time of radically diminished outbound investment by China's major entertainment companies. After a gold rush period five years ago, when Chinese firms were bankrolling everything from Hollywood slates to new U.S. production entities (Huayi co-financed an entire slate at STX Entertainment and bought a sizable stake in the Russos' production venture Agbo), investment ground to halt in 2017 amid official discouragement of such dealmaking by Chinese regulators, and its declined further amid the deteriorating diplomatic relations between Washington and Beijing.

Huayi Tencent's current CEO Yuen Hoi Po, will temporary assume Wang's day-to-day management responsibilities. A new chairman will be elected "as soon as possible," the firm said in a statement. Yuen is currently Huayi Tencent's largest shareholder with a 17.8 percent stake.


PATRICK BRZESKI

patrick.brzeski@thr.com
@thr

threads
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Chinese-Tycoons-CEOs-amp-Tuhao (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69088-Chinese-Tycoons-CEOs-amp-Tuhao)

[GeneChing]

I just can't grok what's happening with PRC media titans right now.


APRIL 20, 20219:27 PM UPDATED 9 HOURS AGO
China's Wanda raising $3 billion ahead of HK IPO for property management unit - sources (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wanda-property-ipo-idUSKBN2C80D7)
By Julie Zhu, Kane Wu

3 MIN READ


HONG KONG (Reuters) - Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group aims to raise 20 billion yuan ($3.08 billion) for its commercial property management business, before listing the unit in Hong Kong by year-end, two people with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

https://static.reuters.com/resources/r/?m=02&d=20210421&t=2&i=1559312003&r=LYNXMPEH3K066&w=1024
FILE PHOTO: A sign of Dalian Wanda Group in China glows during an event announcing strategic partnership between Wanda Group and FIFA in Beijing, China March 21, 2016. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj
Wanda is targeting primarily private equity investors for Wanda Light Asset Commercial Management Co, aiming for a valuation of 200 billion yuan, said the people.

Several prospective investors tapped by Wanda and its financial advisors, however, have found that valuation “too high”, one of the people said.

The conglomerate, owned by Wang Jianlin - once China’s richest person - aims to complete the fundraising by July and file for an initial public offering (IPO) in September, they said.

Wanda Group did not respond to a request for comment.

The people declined to be identified as the information is confidential.

Chinese developers and real estate managers raised a record $10.4 billion in Hong Kong listings last year, showed data from Refinitiv.

China Evergrande Group, Sunac China Holdings Ltd and Shimao Group Holdings Ltd all floated property management businesses last year. The three are currently trading way above their IPO prices.

If Wanda sold a 10% stake - as is typical for a sizeable IPO - then a 200 billion yuan valuation would make the float Hong Kong’s biggest for a property manager at least since 2016, surpassing the $1.8 billion November float of Evergrande Property Services Group Ltd.

The listing plan comes after the unit’s debt-laden parent, Wanda Commercial Management Group - China’s biggest commercial property developer - withdrew a domestic IPO application in March, saying it would revamp its assets and pursue an overseas listing.

The unit, tasked with managing 368 Wanda Plazas plus 155 under construction, secured 3 billion yuan of investment from the government of the southern city of Zhuhai, the parent said last month.

One of the sources said the local government would count as a lead investor in the pre-IPO fundraising.

($1 = 6.4984 Chinese yuan renminbi)

Reporting by Julie Zhu and Kane Wu; Editing by Christopher Cushing

[GeneChing]

What China's Rise to Global Box Office Champs Means for Hollywood's Future (https://www.newsweek.com/china-box-office-hollywood-worried-1580572)
BY JON JACKSON ON 4/29/21 AT 11:30 AM EDT

In 2020, the United States fell from its perch as the world's top box office for the first time in history. Theater closures, delayed releases of major films and public health concerns put the entire film industry in a perpetual standstill. China rose up in its place, assuming the crown of global box office champions. Now, many insiders are wondering if Hollywood will be able to regain its previous preeminence.

With the movie industry on pause, North America's 2020 box office receipts only added up to a total of $2.2 billion—a drop of about 80 percent from 2019's $11.4 billion. Meanwhile, China managed to bring in $3.129 billion in box office revenue throughout 2020. Even though those receipts for China's theaters represent a notable decrease from the country's 2019 total of $9.2 billion, it was still enough of a haul to make China the world's top movie industry last year.

https://d.newsweek.com/en/full/1771473/us-china-flags.webp?w=790&f=de3aeb4ca9b80182d954434466a62986
During the COVID-19 pandemic, China has come out on top as the world's largest box office.
GETTY

For a direct and more recent comparison of Hollywood's woes and China's rise, one need only look at the recent opening of Warner Bros.' Godzilla vs. Kong. The monster-movie smackdown earned a considerably robust, COVID-era record $48.5 million at American theaters during its first five days after opening on March 31. So far, it's made roughly $86.6 million in U.S. theaters, though viewership figures haven't been disclosed from HBO Max, where it is simultaneously streaming.

Over in China, though, where most theaters currently operate with a 75-percent seating capacity, the film opened on March 26 and brought in $70 million in its first weekend alone. The movie has made $183 million in China to date and is projected to make around $5 million more before its run ends there, which would make it (by far) the highest-grossing Hollywood film in China since the start of the pandemic, after Christopher Nolan's Tenet. Currently, Godzilla vs. Kong is the fourth-highest-grossing film of 2021 thus far in China; the top three films are all Chinese titles.

If the outlook for China's cinema looked comparatively good under the circumstances of the global pandemic, 2021 has already shaped up to be better. As of April 21, China's box office revenue for 2021 had reached $3.09 billion, according to film data provider Maoyan Entertainment. Which means in less than four months, it's nearly surpassed last year's 12-month total of $3.129 billion.

The pandemic-necessitated shutdown of theaters surely hastened the fall of U.S. box office dominance, with 2020 being an "aberration, an outlier year," Stanley Rosen told Newsweek. Rosen is a political science professor at the University of Southern California, specializing in Chinese politics, society and film. Like many with knowledge of China's movie industry, Rosen predicted this day would eventually come. "They [China] were going to do it eventually, no question about that," he said. "It was just a question of what year."

All of the experts Newsweek spoke with for this story agree with Rosen's assessment that China's claiming of the movie throne was inevitable. Still, a film expert and history professor at the University of Southern California, Steven Ross, had a more optimistic outlook for Hollywood's future, at least in the short term. "We still have some of the most advanced structures for filmmaking, and we also have a huge pipeline in terms of talent of writers, directors, actors and producers," Ross said. "So, I still think the U.S. is in a position to lead through the good part of the next decade or two in the 21st century. Beyond that, I'm not sure."

One might wonder, though: How could Hollywood be overtaken by a country whose own hit movies rarely travel overseas? Well, consider the sheer numbers. China has a population of around 1.4 billion people; the U.S. counts about 330 million. Then there's the fact that Chinese companies started to realize how much money could be made from building new theaters, sometimes in unexpected locations.

https://d.newsweek.com/en/full/1782311/godzilla-kong.webp?w=790&f=6043139a5d5ec355f653bae060f8b798
A moviegoer enters the AMC Lincoln Square 13 movie theater on March 05, 2021 in New York City. AMC.
GETTY
Wanda Group, China's largest cinema operator, has been steadily staking claim in smaller-tier cities such as Chengdu, Shenyang and Wuhan, where many people live in undesirable housing. Starting in the early 2000s, the company began building modern malls with inexpensive restaurants, museums and, of course, movie theaters. This meant "families could come there on Saturday and Sunday and spend all day," film director Scott Morgan explained to Newsweek. Before he founded Creativity First Films studios, Morgan spent decades extensively traveling throughout Asia and more than five years working within the Chinese film industry. He also predicted the country's eventual box office takeover with his 2016 book, The Future of Hollywood-China Film, Media, and Finance.

The theater-mall model proved successful, and theaters and screens still continue growing in China, while many are closing in the United States. In 2019, China added 9,708 new screens and 1,453 new theaters. Even during the pandemic, the country added 300 more theaters and 5,794 more screens in 2020, which brought its nationwide total up to 75,581 screens. This expansion is continuing in 2021, with China's addition of 2,188 new screens in January and February alone. Before March began, the nation counted 77,769 total screens. The U.S., meanwhile, ended 2020 with 40,998 screens, down 174 from the previous year.

More people and more screens gives China an edge, but so does the fact that China recovered from the pandemic more quickly. After six months of being shut down, theaters began reopening there at half-capacity in July, before allowing 75-percent capacity by September. (Areas where recent, small outbreaks have occurred caused capacities to drop back down to 50 percent at times, including in Beijing.) U.S. theaters have slowly reopened at limited capacities, though the largest cities have been lagging far behind smaller cities. New York City only finally reopened theaters at the beginning of March, with venues restricting audiences to a maximum of 25-percent capacity per screening.

"I don't think that their production of films went up," Morgan said of China's film studios and the dramatic success they experienced during the pandemic. "But they were feeling a lot of China pride."
continued next post

[GeneChing]

That cultural pride looks to have translated into big box office returns for domestic features, a trend that had already been developing in recent years. Thirty-three out of the top 50 highest-grossing films in Chinese history are Chinese films (including several co-productions between China and Hong Kong), with the oldest domestic entries on the list being a few titles from 2015. The other 17 pictures on China's highest-grossing films list are American films: Marvel superhero films, sci-fi action blockbusters like Avatar and entries from the Fast & Furious franchise. Rosen explained that the reason these imports play well there is because little work is required to translate action or animated fare.

"The most successful [Chinese-made] films have been patriotic films, so the government certainly encourages them," Rosen said. Indeed, the country's—and, thus by extension, the world's—biggest moneymaking picture last year was The Eight Hundred. The historical war drama brought in more than $460 million, nearly all of which was made during its homeland theatrical run. Like with India's Bollywood industry, many of China's biggest hits underperform outside of their home country, where cultural references and topics like The Eight Hundred's take on the Second Sino-Japanese War carry less significance. Often, China's most successful domestic smashes never make it onto foreign screens.

China has also relied on the help of the West in productions, like when a studio hired the Russo brothers to consult on the 2017 blockbuster Wolf Warrior 2. (That film, incidentally, is currently No. 1 on the country's list of top-grossing movies ever.) The Russos, who have directed some of Marvel's biggest films, also took note and in 2016 launched Anthem & Song, a studio that produces Chinese-language films for the Middle Kingdom market.

While Hollywood could very well likely bounce back from the pandemic, it will be met by a Chinese movie industry that's been steadily growing for some time. To an extent, Rosen said, this should benefit U.S. films when they travel to China screens. "A rising tide lifts all ships," he said. "So, [Hollywood studios] hope to be lifted with that as well, and I still think really big-budget films should do fine in China."

Of course, some Hollywood films will have trouble in China, because of certain circumstances and hurdles that need to be cleared. China has a notoriously harsh censorship board, for one. Because of this, Hollywood will often self-censor films with anything politically risky before opening in China, to avoid losing massive ticket sales.

Take Marvel's Doctor Strange. In the comics, the titular sorcerer has a Tibetan mentor, but that character was reimagined in the film to be Celtic, played by Tilda Swinton. Though screenwriters on the production indicated that the character's race and background were changed to avoid controversy in China, director Scott Derrickson said he didn't want to engage in what he felt was a bad Asian stereotype. (He was accused of whitewashing, nonetheless.) There have also been instances in recent years of American studios blatantly attempting to court Chinese audiences. One such notable example of this is another Marvel flick—the Chinese version of Iron Man 3, which included additional scenes of a Chinese doctor operating on Tony Stark.

Since it's become more widely known that American studios sometimes tweak films to suit China, it's turned into a political issue. Last year, Congressional conservatives introduced legislation that cut off American producers from government funding if they were found to be changing films to please China. Senator Ted Cruz cited the repeatedly delayed Top Gun sequel on the floor of the U.S. Senate last May. Noting that Tom Cruise's character's leather flight jacket was altered from the original film's version, to remove Taiwanese and Japanese flags, Cruz stated, "What message does it send that Maverick, an American icon, is apparently afraid of the Chinese communists?"

The fact that the U.S. film industry has been cautious about upsetting China's government, as well as its moviegoing public, isn't entirely surprising. The box office in China has long been the second-largest for American films outside of the U.S., and some big-budget releases face "make or break" consequences when screened in the Middle Kingdom. For example, 2016's Resident Evil: The Final Chapter made only $26.8 million in North America, yet it was considered a hit after it grossed $159.5 million in China.

But there's also the matter of just getting an American-made movie into Chinese theaters. "There are still quotas in China as far as the amount of American films that can run there," said Peter Newman, a film professor and head of the dual MBA/MFA Graduate program at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. Currently, the country has a quota in place that allows only 34 imported films a year to open in theaters, though there are concessions when a Chinese company co-produces.

"The policies of the [Chinese] government and the entertainment business change, literally, on a weekly basis," Newman explained. He cited the example of Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained in 2013. Some of the bloodshed and violence in the film was cut to appease Chinese censors, yet the Jamie Foxx-starring Western was then abruptly pulled from theaters on the day of its opening without explanation.

Then there are national holidays, Rose noted. During those times, "Hollywood and other foreign-language films are not allowed into China. So [domestic films] have a built-in audience." The Chinese New Year is the the country's biggest moviegoing time of the year, and also one when only domestic films are featured. This year's holiday broke all previous records by topping $1.206 billion for the week, surpassing the previous record set in 2019 by 32.5 percent, according to Chinese ticketing platform Maoyan Entertainment. (All theaters were shut down in the country during the 2020 Chinese New Year.)

Due to the limitations put on American and other foreign films in the market, failures at the Chinese box office are particularly costly, especially when they're films distinctly tailored for the country. The 2016 film The Great Wall is an oft-cited example. The American and Chinese co-production featured a large budget ($150 million) and a famous native director (Zhang Yimou), but was accused of whitewashing due to the casting of Matt Damon in the lead role, and it went on to lose a reported $75 million.

More recently, Disney pinned great hopes on Niki Caro's live-action Mulan, which opened in China last summer after not being able to screen on American shores. Historical inaccuracies and several other controversies—such as a mostly white production crew—dogged that release, which also underperformed in China.

Recent Oscar-winner Chloé Zhao also presented a dilemma for China, as well as symbolized the divide between government censors and portions of the Chinese public. Newman, a professor of Zhao's when she attended NYU's film school, said when Nomadland first took home the Golden Globe award for Best Picture and the Beijing-born Zhao nabbed Best Director, China's press heralded her as "something like 'hometown girl makes good.'" Then, a 2013 interview Zhao gave to Filmmaker Magazine resurfaced and quickly changed the narrative. In it, she discussed growing up in China, and characterized it as "a place where there are lies everywhere."

https://d.newsweek.com/en/full/1782315/zhao.webp?w=790&f=b6bc601bef2be7d94bcc09bde75a062b
Chloé Zhao speaks onstage during the 2018 Film Independent Spirit Awards on March 3, 2018, in Santa Monica, California.
GETTY
Zhao, of course, made history at the Oscars recently when she became the first Chinese woman and woman of color to be awarded the trophy for Best Director, and her film Nomadland was recognized as Best Picture. However, her home country's government imposed a news blackout with state-run news media outlets, mostly ignoring any mentions of the Oscars or Zhao. China's social media platforms also worked hard at deleting or restricting the spread of news about Zhao's big night, though clever fans blurred her name and turned photos on their sides intentionally to avoid censors.

Marvel will soon face a major test from China's censors later this year with Zhao's next film, Eternals, a superhero blockbuster starring Angelina Jolie, Kumail Nanjiani and Salma Hayek. Given the financial success that Marvel typically finds in China, the film not screening there could be a huge loss, should it not get by the film censors of The Publicity Department of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. (Newsweek contacted the Chinese publicity agency for comment on this story but did not receive a response as of press time.)

Needless to say, the stakes and tensions should be high as the box office competition between China and the U.S. ramps up once we're clear of the COVID-19 pandemic. But not everyone is completely writing off a relationship between the two countries' film industries. This is especially true when both countries can benefit financially by working together. "The pot of money is just too big," Newman noted. "I think they're going to keep trying to figure it out." So many questions

[GeneChing]

Anyone here seen Hi, Mom yet?


May 14, 2021 4:07am PT
Move Over, Patty Jenkins: How China’s Jia Ling Became the World’s Highest-Grossing Female Director (https://variety.com/2021/film/news/jia-ling-world-top-female-director-1234973045/)

By Rebecca Davis

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Hi-Mom.jpg
Courtesy Tiger Pictures Int’l
She may not be a household name anywhere other than her native China, but Chinese helmer Jia Ling has officially overtaken Patty Jenkins as the world’s highest-grossing female director for a single film.

After an extended three-month run, Jia’s Chinese New Year blockbuster “Hi, Mom,” finally left Chinese theaters Tuesday. It has grossed $838 million (RMB5.41 billion) since its Feb. 12 debut, according to Maoyan data and using an exchange rate of $1 = RMB6.44)

That sum makes it the 79th highest grossing film in the world of all time, behind Marvel’s “Thor: Ragnarok” ($854 million) and just ahead of Christopher Nolan’s “Inception” ($837 million). It also finished above Patty Jenkin’s 2017 “Wonder Woman,” which earned $823 million. “Hi, Mom” surpassed “Wonder Woman” in early April, 54 days after its release. (Some sources using different rates of exchange may arrive at different totals and rankings.)

Locally, the title has now surpassed the 2019 animation “Ne Zha” to become the second highest ever grossing film in China, behind 2017’s “Wolf Warrior 2,” which earned $854 million, or $881 million at today’s currency conversion rate (RMB5.69 billion). Jia is now just one of 11 Chinese women who have directed films that grossed over $15.5 million (RMB100 million).

Incredibly, Jia has hit these milestones with her first feature, on the back of ticket sales from China alone, and amidst a pandemic that left cinemas there capped at 50-75% their maximum capacity.

“Now that our box office has reached 5.4 billion, I want to thank you guys, but I don’t know what to say,” Jia wrote in one of her first personal reflections since the film’s debut, posted to her Weibo social media account on May 9, Mother’s Day. “All of it was unexpected — unexpected to the point that although I’d been prepared to heavily promote the film, once it came out [and was so successful], I was practically embarrassed to do so.”

Jia, 39, is known for her prowess as a performer of a popular type of Chinese stand-up comedy, known as crosstalk. She rose to national prominence after appearing in 2010 at CCTV’s annual Spring Festival Gala, one of the most watched TV programs in the world.

“Hi, Mom” originated as a highly personal theatrical play, written, directed and starring Jia as a reflection and homage to her relationship with her mother, who passed away when she was a girl.

The film adaptation, hilarious and heart-rending in turn, is also written and directed by Jia, who stars. She plays a fictional version of herself as a woman grieving over her mother’s accidental death who finds herself suddenly transported to 1981, where she tries to befriend her mom and direct her towards a better life.

The success of “Hi, Mom” has rocketed Big Bowl Entertainment, the company Jia founded in 2016 to produce it, into the position of becoming a major contender in China’s film space, potentially comparable to Mahua FunAge (“Mr. Donkey,” “Goodbye, Mr. Loser”).

It has also minted a proper star out of lead Zhang Xiaofei, and propelled the film’s one well-known name Shen Teng on to become China’s highest grossing actor, with the cumulative box office generated by his films now beyond the $3 billion (RMB20 billion) mark.

Surprise Upset
The success of “Hi, Mom” has been a true underdog story.

This was an unknown title with a basically little-known cast going into Chinese New Year, the most lucrative but also the most competitive movie-going week of the year.

Even its own main producer, Beijing Culture, bet against it, selling off most of its stake in the film. The financially troubled firm hedged its risks on the reportedly $62 million (RMB400 million) budgeted film and signed a minimum guarantee agreement with distributors Maoyan Entertainment and Shanghai Ruyi for a reported $232 million (RMB1.5 billion), according to the official Xinhua news agency.

Then came the surprise.

While frontrunner “Detective Chinatown 3” — a big budget franchise spectacle starring China’s most viral stars — broke records as expected on day one, “Hi, Mom” surpassed it in single-day sales by day four. Sales for “Hi, Mom” beat “Detective Chinatown’s” cume in just 10 days.

“It just shows the magic of movies, that you really can’t predict how well something will perform. No one had expected ‘Hi, Mom’ to be as big as it was — including Beijing Culture,” Shawn Yue, a producer on “Detective Chinatown 3,” told Variety in March.

Given how much China’s cinema programmers are swayed by word of mouth metrics, a big factor in the initial surge of support for “Hi, Mom” was its strategy for gaming an usually fierce ratings war.

Yue praised the “Hi, Mom” team’s marketing efforts — “they spent a lot of money to ferment their word of mouth,” he admits — but suspects the film also benefited from the pleasure and sense of accomplishment viewers got from propelling it to the top.

Troves of viewers started rating “Hi, Mom” five stars and “Detective Chinatown” one star, encouraged on perhaps by the thrill of helping “a new David emerge to kill Goliath.”

“Enough Already”
Later on, “Hi, Mom” benefited from an unusually long 90-day release, which has made it the subject of online criticism.

Films in China are typically given a month-long release period that can be extended to two months in the case of unusually high-performing titles. But “Hi, Mom” was given two extensions, making it the first film in Chinese history to reap the benefits of two holiday release windows — the massive February lunar new year and the May 1 Labor Day holiday. It also managed to hit Mother’s Day on May 9 as well, when it was also released for free on various streaming platforms for a limited time.

“Enough already,” many Weibo commenters said in response to the news of its second extension, chastizing the film for appearing desperately greedy.

Bloggers scratched their heads incredulously as they considered that “Hi, Mom” alone has grossed more than the entirety of Zhang Yimou’s oeuvre of more than 40 films put together, or Feng Xiaogang in his whole career.

Jia’s heartfelt Mother’s Day post appears to have smoothed most ruffled feathers, however. “Yesterday I watched ‘Soul’ — a great film — and realized that I’ve been obsessed with certain things in recent years, and had forgotten how to appreciate much of the scenery around me,” she said, explaining her plans to finally learn to ski and spend time catching crayfish in her hometown with friends.

She concluded with a touching tribute to her muse, her mom.

“In this world, there once was a person who lived for me… When the person who lived for you in this world is gone, it’s even more important for you to live well in her stead,” she wrote.

[GeneChing]

May 18, 2021 12:09pm PT
Box Office: ‘F9’ Eyes Massive $150 Million-Plus Debut Overseas (https://variety.com/2021/film/news/f9-opening-weekend-international-box-office-1234975770/)

By Rebecca Rubin

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/fast-3.jpg?resize=681,383
Giles Keyte/Universal
“F9” could send the box office into overdrive when it debuts overseas this weekend.

The latest entry in Universal’s high-octane franchise, which opens in Korea, Hong Kong, the Middle East, Russia and China in the coming days, is expected to bring in at least $150 million to $180 million at the international box office. Industry analysts are offering a wide range, which could balloon even higher, because it’s hard to track initial grosses in foreign markets even when the world isn’t rebounding from a pandemic. As different parts of the globe recover from COVID-19 at different paces, it’s especially challenging to forecast box office ticket sales.

Outside of the U.S, where “F9” is scheduled to open on June 25, moviegoing has nearly returned to full strength. Asian markets, particularly China and Japan, have been a source of optimism after recently ushering in several blockbusters including “Hi Mom,” “Detective Chinatown 3” and “Demon Slayer: Mugen Train.” Hollywood movies, in post-pandemic times, have seen mixed results internationally.

Among Hollywood films, the Warner Bros. movie “Godzilla vs. Kong” holds the record for the best opening overseas in the pandemic era. It debuted to $121 million from 38 foreign countries. Even if “F9” falls short of expectations, it should easily surpass that benchmark.

“F9” was initially slated for last summer, but its release was delayed numerous times during the pandemic. A movie like “F9,” which cost $200 million to produce, is engineered for global audiences and requires outsize ticket sales to get out of the red. It would have been impossible to turn a profit if it were released any earlier, since the majority of movie theaters weren’t in operation. Globally, the nine “Fast” movies have earned more than $5 billion at the box office.

The film will continue to roll out in 62 markets throughout the summer, including Australia (June 17), Latin America and the U.S. (June 25), and the United Kingdom, Spain, France and Germany in July.

China will be a key territory for “F9.” That’s not just because the country has recently overtaken the U.S. as the world’s biggest movie market and has been less reliant on Hollywood fare to fuel attendance levels. In prior “Fast and Furious” installments, nearly 30% of global box office totals came from China alone. The most recent chapters in the main “Fast” saga, 2015’s “Furious 7” and 2017’s “The Fate of the Furious,” were enormous hits with each making roughly $390 million in China.

In China, “F9” is currently pacing ahead of competitors in terms of presales and has already sold $10.5 million (RMB66.6 million) worth of tickets for opening day. More than 80.7% of the country’s movie theaters — accounting for roughly 154,000 screens — will be devoted to playing “F9.” Yet it remains to be seen if ticket sales can surpass (or even match) other “Fast” movies in the territory.

Filmmaker Justin Lin, who directed four prior “Fast and Furious” movies,” returned for the series’ latest lap in theaters. “F9” stars Vin Diesel, Michelle Rodriguez, John Cena and Helen Mirren and follows Diesel’s Dominic Toretto and his family as they take on their fiercest foe yet — Dom’s brother. That journey somehow takes them to space.

So far, “F9” has received mixed feedback. Variety’s chief film critic Owen Gleiberman says the film “gets stuck in franchise overdrive.” That’s saying something, considering the property’s increasingly loony stunts, which don’t even pretend to obey the laws of physics, have become its greatest marketing tool. Yet Gleiberman notes “it goes through the motions with more energy than intoxication.” IndieWire’s critic David Ehrlich gave the film a “C+” grade, but offered that “for the first time in a long time it feels like it’s drifting in the right direction again.”

After more than a year of movie delays, audiences appear to be less bogged down by plot and more hypnotized by onscreen action when it comes to buying movie tickets. “Godzilla vs. Kong” and “Mortal Kombat” generated promising sales in the U.S. (while being offered simultaneously on HBO Max), though neither inspired notably strong reviews.

Leading up to the release of “F9” in the States, Hollywood is planning to unveil a range of major titles including “Black Widow,” “A Quiet Place Part II” and “In the Heights.” For theater owners, who have gone months without much to show on the big screen, summer means one thing: it’s finally time to put the pedal to the metal.

Becky Davis contributed to this report.

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[GeneChing]

May 23, 2021 9:45pm PT
China Box Office: ‘F9’ Clocks up $137 Million in its Opening Lap (https://variety.com/2021/film/asia/china-box-office-f9-opening-weekend-1234979977/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/fast-1.jpg?resize=681,383
Giles Keyte/Universal
“F9” roared into the lead at the China box office, where the “Fast and Furious” franchise has repeatedly lapped faster than in North America.

On its first weekend in China the film grossed $137 million, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway.

That gave it an 83% share of the China weekend box office, a market share figure that was notably stable from its Friday lights out. Total box office in the country was $165 million between Friday and Sunday.

Some $12.45 million of the “F9” total was earned from Imax screens in China. That was Imax’s third biggest May opening score (behind “Avengers: Infinity War” and “Avengers: Age of Ultron”) and Universal’s second-best China opening weekend in Imax venues behind “Fate of the Furious.” The giant screen provider calculates that earning 9% of the nationwide box office from just 1% of the screens showing the film, is a franchise-best result.

The runaway win was achieved despite a mediocre critical reception in China. On the fan review site Douban “F9” earned only a 5.6 out of ten critical rating. On the more generous ticketing platforms Mtime and Taopiaopiao it earned only slightly better scores of 6.2 and 7.8, respectively.

Artisan Gateway, nevertheless, calculates that the powerful performance was good for overall health of the theatrical economy. Its data shows that the year-to-date box office cumulative is now $3.86 billion, only 6.5% down on pre-COVID 2019. A week earlier, the gap had been 10%.

Gritty Chinese romance, “Love Will Tear Us Apart” released a day earlier than “F9” on Thursday in order to coincide with (yet another) local Valentine’s Day. It earned $15.6 million on Thursday and a further $15.1 million between Friday and Sunday, good enough for second place in the local chart.

Previous chart-topper, Zhang Yimou’s “Cliff Walkers” was edged into third place by the two new releases and earned $5.1 million over the weekend. That lifted its cumulative to $164 million since its pre-May Day release on April 30.

Japanese film “Love Letter” was re-released on Thursday and managed $4.1 million over the weekend and $7.4 million over four days.


threads
F9 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70501-F9)
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[GeneChing]

May 26, 2021
2:58 AM PDT
Media & Telecom
Fast & Furious star John Cena apologises for calling Taiwan a country (https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/fast-furious-star-john-cena-apologises-calling-taiwan-country-2021-05-26/)
Yew Lun Tian

3 minute read
https://www.reuters.com/resizer/2CiAC7IJLLte2VLoOOy9u_kMYc0=/1200x0/filters:quality(80)/cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com/reuters/VHJX7JYCZ5L7ZHCAAQD4NGKTT4.jpg
Cast member John Cena poses at the premiere for "Ferdinand" in Los Angeles, California, U.S., December 10, 2017. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

U.S. wrestling superstar and actor John Cena apologised to Chinese fans on Tuesday after calling Taiwan a country during an interview to promote his latest movie "Fast & Furious 9".

Speaking to Taiwanese television TVBS earlier this month, 44-year-old Cena said Taiwan would be the first "country" to see the latest Fast and Furious.

China regards Taiwan as its province, an assertion that most on the self-ruled, democratic island rejects.

"I made one mistake. I am very, very sorry for this mistake," Cena said in Mandarin in a video posted on his account on Weibo, a Twitter-like microblog popular in China.

"I love and respect China and the Chinese people," he added.

Cena joins a long list of international celebrities who have incurred the wrath of an increasingly nationalistic Chinese public over their comments about Taiwan, Hong Kong or Xinjiang.

Companies have also come under fire, with several airlines and hotels apologising to China in recent years for listing Taiwan as a country on their booking websites.

Cena's apology was not enough for many mainland Chinese netizens.

"Please use Mandarin to say Taiwan is part of China. Otherwise we won't accept the apology," read a comment left on Cena's apology video that received the most "likes".

Neither did the apology go down well in the United States.

"Can someone please help John Cena locate his spine, please?" wrote Matt Karolian, manager of American news website Boston.com, on Twitter.

U.S. Senator Tom Cotton called the apology "pathetic" in a tweet.

China's foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said in response that criticism of Cena in the United States did not make sense.

Cotton's remarks were "just like waste paper," he added, speaking at a regular news conference in Beijing on Wednesday.

Taiwan's Foreign Ministry declined to comment.

The movie has been a box office hit in mainland China since its open on May 21.

Over the last weekend, China accounted for $135 million of the movie's $162 million in revenue, according to U.S. entertainment publication Variety.


‘Late Show with Stephen Colbert’ Mocks John Cena’s Apology to China
The movie star and former pro-wrestler started an international controversy for calling Taiwan a country and then walking the comment back.
BY RYAN PARKER
MAY 27, 2021 6:16AM
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/GettyImages-1183632150.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
John Cena
John Cena attends 'Playing With Fire' New York Premiere at AMC Lincoln Square Theater on October 26, 2019 in New York City. JOHN LAMPARSKI/FILMMAGIC
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Wednesday mocked John Cena’s recent apology to China after he called Taiwan a country.

The movie star and former pro-wrestler started an international controversy after making the statement during a promotional interview for his upcoming film, F9 — then issuing an apology (in Mandarin) to China.

“I made a mistake,” Cena said in his apology video issued Tuesday. “Now I have to say one thing which is very, very, very important: I love and respect China and Chinese people. I’m very sorry for my mistakes. Sorry. Sorry. I’m really sorry. You have to understand that I love and respect China and Chinese people.”

The Late Show on Wednesday released the “full” apology video, mocking Cena’s decision. “Not only is Taiwan not a country, it is also not even a real place,” read the faux interruption of Cena’s words. “It’s like Zootopia, which coincidentally made $220 million in China.”

Continued the faux interruption, “And don’t even get me started on Tibet! Always complaining, complaining, complaining about China. I will give Tibet something to complain about.” The video then cut to Cena bodyslamming a digital 14th Dalai Lama (“I call that a ‘Daili-Slam-A,” read the faux interruption).

The Cena matter highlighted the fraught relationship between Hollywood and China. Entertainment industry figures, including professional sports players, have been criticized for comments perceived as political. And Hollywood studios have been criticized over claims that they shape content to avoid offending Chinese government censors.

Watch the Late Show video below.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XI2IkPNteO4

F9 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70501-F9)
Chollywood-rising (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

Chollywood Risen. READ F9: THE FAST SAGA Cruising Back into Theaters (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/ezine/article.php?article=1598) by Gene Ching

http://www.kungfumagazine.com//admin/site_images/KungfuMagazine/images/ezine/7222_F9-Fast-and-Furious_Lead.jpg

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[GeneChing]

Jul 9, 2021 4:35pm PT
‘Black Widow’s’ China Delay Rings Alarm Bells for Hollywood (https://variety.com/2021/film/news/black-widow-china-box-office-troubles-1235016323/)

By Rebecca Davis

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/BBU-00091_R-2.jpg
Jay Maidment / Courtesy of Marvel Studios
The U.S. film industry is heaving a sigh of relief that “Black Widow” is poised to become the highest grossing domestic debut of the post-pandemic era, marking America’s return to moviegoing in force.

The Scarlett Johansson-starrer is projected to earn around $80 million in its North American opening weekend, beating out “F9” last month. It will also premiere in 46 overseas markets, bringing in an expected $50 million.

China, however, isn’t on the roster.

The picture for “Black Widow” is far from rosy in the world’s largest film market, where politics are proving once again to trump profit, and piracy may destroy its box office odds before it manages to reach Chinese shores.

Although China’s censorship authorities approved “Black Widow” for release back in March, Marvel has yet to offer any indication of a release date for the key territory. (Hong Kong, meanwhile, was actually one of the first territories in the world to release it on July 7, thanks to its Asia time zone.)

A belated China release could spell trouble. Disney Plus does not operate in China. When the streaming service released the film online for a $30 fee in other territories Friday, it unleashed an easily pirated, high-definition version of the film that reached Chinese consumers within hours.

Popular on Variety
“From today on, all kinds of pirated versions of ‘Black Widow’ will begin to spread rapidly,” one film blogger wrote in resignation. “Even if it is released theatrically later, this will undoubtedly have a significant impact on the box office.”

As of Friday morning, Variety found scores of pirated videos and torrents already available on unauthorized Chinese file sharing and streaming sites, although their initial origins are unclear. On certain illegal sites powered by online gaming ads, many are available to stream for free without any registration or download procedures via a single click.

Many pirated copies are listed as 1080p HD or 4K quality, or equipped with Dolby Atmos sound. Most come already outfitted with Chinese subtitles, which are often created by groups of fast-acting volunteers or fans before the official translation is released.

On one of the major fan-generated subtitle websites, at least nine different versions of Chinese “Black Widow” subtitles were available on the front page alone. They can be downloaded separately to pair with different versions of the pirated film. The site declares that “subtitles are only used for language learning purposes; the copyright belongs to the film production.”

The same piracy issue plagued Disney’s $200 million live-action “Mulan” in China, tanking hopes that the China-set retelling of a classic Chinese folk tale with an Asian cast would become a breakout hit there. It garnered a lackluster $23 million opening weekend and $41 million cume, albeit with significant capacity restrictions on cinemas due to COVID-19.

Death Sentence for ‘Black Widow’ in China?
From a purely economic point of view, China’s delay of surefire commercial hit “Black Widow” makes little sense, particularly since its box office has been on the downswing since June, when it hit a record monthly low.

The country notched a number of box office records earlier this year off local holiday blockbuster hits, but rescheduled Hollywood tentpoles and a diminishing pool of moneymaking local productions have slowed business down. The film industry’s political obligations for July are slowing it further.

Generally, Beijing tends to program Hollywood blockbusters sparingly in the key moviegoing month of July to carve out space for local productions. This year, its resistance to scheduling foreign films has been exacerbated by the critical 100th anniversary of the ruling Communist Party’s founding on July 1. The occasion has been accompanied by an ongoing, months-long period of militant censorship across all media that will last through the end of the month and likely into fall.

With those factors in mind, local reports have long been predicting a death sentence for “Black Widow’s” China prospects.

“The possibility of a simultaneous release is approaching zero. In this special [July] tribute month, even ‘main melody’ [propagandistic] movies like ‘Chinese Doctors’ are facing strict censorship, let alone Hollywood films,” a blogger wrote pessimistically in June.

Beijing considers it politically paramount for the Party’s propaganda tribute films to reign over their competitors this month. Though the melodramatic titles were widely promoted, they have unsurprisingly not proved popular enough to drive Marvel-level ticket sales.

China’s major July titles are the political history films “1921” and “The Pioneer,” which have grossed just $58 million (RMB376 million) and $15.4 million (RMB100 million) so far, respectively, since their July 1 debut. The most commercial blockbuster of the bunch is the Bona Film-backed pandemic blockbuster “Chinese Doctors.” It had a muted $14.4 million opening Friday, taking what would have been “Black Widow’s” slot had it opened day-and-date with the U.S. and emerging a poor substitute.

Unverifiable local reports speculate the “Black Widow” may not release in China until mid-August, when there may be a sudden influx of Hollywood films that could end up cannibalizing each other’s box office.

Disney did not respond to a request for comment on the movie’s release date circumstances or piracy concerns.

Release Date Limbo
The “Black Widow” situation highlights the growing challenges Hollywood is facing in the post-pandemic era, as Beijing and Washington view each other with growing suspicion and new digital distribution models upend decades-old practices.

Increasingly, foreign films are finding themselves in release date limbo or unexpectedly pulled due to China’s ever-changing political winds and local programming priorities. (For instance, censors approved Pixar’s “Luca” in late May, but it has yet to set a debut.)

When theatrical windows of at least three months were still observed, digital or Blu-ray releases did not heavily impact a film’s China box office, since imports are only allowed to play in Chinese theaters for one to two months anyway, no matter how successful.

If Hollywood’s pandemic-era embrace of previously unthinkable modes of online distribution are here to stay, piracy will be a growing problem. It will become increasingly important for films seeking to guarantee the strongest possible China sales to release there before other territories or open simultaneously with their streaming debut.

A growing number of tentpoles with guaranteed Chinese audiences have already taken this approach, such as “Avengers: Endgame,” which gave China a two-day head start on the U.S., or “F9,” which was prompted by the pandemic to premiere an unprecedented full month ahead of domestic.

Locking in a China date has grown increasingly difficult as bureaucratic processes and priorities grow stricter and more opaque, meaning that companies may have to initiate censorship review processes even earlier.

Warner Bros.’ “Dune” may avoid a “Black Widow”-esque conundrum. Had the film debuted Oct. 1 as originally planned, it would have run into China’s highly political National Day holiday that same day, when it would have been elbowed out of a day-and-date release and put off for perhaps the next two weeks in order to give new nationalistic blockbusters time to sell.

Whether or not the decision to move it to Oct. 22 was intentionally made with the China market in mind, it bodes well.

“Maintaining good relations to secure release dates, combatting piracy, and deploying strong tactics to shore up word of mouth will be the most critical tasks for Hollywood revenue-share films going forward, particularly for films planning to release simultaneous both in theaters and online,” a well-regarded local film industry outlet said. “Otherwise, more and more revenue-share films will repeat the mistakes of ‘Mulan’ and ‘Black Widow,’ bringing down Hollywood’s China profits.”

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[GeneChing]

Hollywood’s China Box Office Hopes Dim As Fewer Tentpoles Get Releases (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/china-box-office-release-dates-1234998835/)
Only 13 revenue-sharing U.S. studio titles have been released in the country so far in 2021, down from the 22 titles that were released by the end of July in 2019.


BY PATRICK BRZESKI

AUGUST 17, 2021 6:07PM
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/GettyImages-1234610520-H-2021.jpg?crop=0px%2C5px%2C1296px%2C725px&resize=681%2C383
Spectators attend movie screening of Disney's 'Free Guy' at a movie theater in Hong Kong. BUDRUL CHUKRUT/SOPA IMAGES/LIGHTROCKET VIA GETTY IMAGES
Chinese films have reaped record earnings at their country’s theatrical box office in 2021, but Hollywood ticket revenue in the Middle Kingdom remains mostly in the doldrums. Now, an outbreak of the delta variant, rampant piracy and unpredictable political challenges are clouding the picture for the U.S. film industry’s hopes for an end-of-year comeback in China, which has emerged from the pandemic as the world’s largest theatrical marketplace by far.

Chinese-language films not only have recovered from the darkest days of the pandemic, when taken in aggregate, they are performing better than ever before. Local titles, led by huge hits like Beijing Culture’s Hi, Mom ($822.1 million) and Bona Film Group’s Chinese Doctors ($197 million), collectively earned $3.9 billion at China’s box office from Jan. 1-July 31, considerably better than the pre-pandemic benchmark years of 2018 and 2019, when sales for the same period totaled $3.8 billion and $2.9 billion, respectively, according to data collected by consultancy Artisan Gateway.


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Hollywood imports have achieved little of the same recovery in China, however. In 2021, imported U.S. studio films had earned just $700 million as of July 31, down 66 percent compared to sales over the same stretch in 2019 ($2.1 billion), and falling 61 percent from 2018 ($1.8 billion).

Overall, China’s annual box office was down 15 percent during the first seven months of 2021, from $5.5 billion in 2019 to $4.7 billion this year, with a decline in total sales for Hollywood product comprising nearly all of the shortfall.

The biggest problem, analysts say, is simply a dearth of product. Release delays related to the pandemic resulted in a scant few U.S. movies hitting Chinese screens during the first half of the year. And Beijing film regulators’ usual blackout on foreign film releases during the peak summer moviegoing period has been stricter and longer than usual in deference to this year’s politically high-profile 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party. Altogether, only 13 revenue-sharing U.S. studio titles have been released in China so far in 2021, down from the 22 titles that were released by the end of July in 2019, and 26 in the same stretch of 2018.

The last U.S. movie to open in China was Sony’s Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway on June 11 (it earned $30.7 million), and the only Hollywood movie granted a release date since is Disney/Pixar’s Luca, scheduled for Aug. 20. The backlog of tentpoles awaiting release dates as China’s summer blackout on Hollywood winds down include: Disney’s Black Widow, Jungle Cruise and Free Guy; and Warner Bros’ Space Jam: A New Legacy and The Suicide Squad. Disney and Marvel’s rapidly approaching Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, set to open in the U.S. and most major global markets on Sept. 3, also remains unscheduled in China.


The rare U.S. tentpoles that have opened in China this year have demonstrated that the Chinese audience, irregardless of growing nationalist sentiment in the country, remains ready to embrace effects-heavy Hollywood spectacle. Warner Bros. and Legendary’s Godzilla vs. Kong earned a healthy $135.4 million in China in March, followed by Universal’s F9: The Fast Saga, which debuted on May 21 and pulled in $203.8 million.

But the recent spread of the highly infectious Delta variant in China has many in the local industry on edge. Beijing’s aggressive “zero COVID” policy means that the broad swaths of the country’s services sector, including cinemas, are at risk of total shutdown the moment a nearby local infection is discovered. Thus far, Chinese authorities’ drastic measures, including the testing of entire cities and shutdowns in inter-province travel, have failed to fully stamp out the Delta variant. As of Aug. 13, locally transmitted COVID-19 cases had been discovered in half of China’s 26 provinces and reached 878 total infections, more than double the 390 cases recorded for the entire month of July, data reported daily by China’s National Health Commission shows.

“The impact of the ongoing pandemic cannot be understated,” says Rance Pow, president of Artisan Gateway, who notes that nearly 3,500 cinemas have been recently closed in China as a precautionary measure related to Delta variant spread. “We’ll be closely watching local handling of the current outbreak, as well as the developing release calendar, for signs of a late year turnaround,” he adds.

But even assuming the emergence of a favorable release schedule and total local elimination of the Delta variant — both big ifs — all of the currently unreleased Hollywood product faces another obstacle that could prove just as pernicious: Piracy.

Thanks to Disney and WarnerMedia’s controversial strategy of releasing recent tentpoles simultaneously in cinemas and over their in-house streaming services, Disney+ and HBO Max, high-definition copies of Black Widow, Space Jam, The Suicide Squad and Jungle Cruise have been available on easy-to-access Chinese piracy networks for weeks.

Further darkening the overall earnings outlook, Disney, consistently the most successful U.S. studio in China, must contend with murky political challenges surrounding its remaining two Marvel superhero tentpoles for 2021 — the franchise that has consistently been the company’s most bankable product in the China by far (Avengers: Endgame remains the highest grossing U.S. movie ever with $629 million).

Marvel’s Eternals, due to begin its worldwide release in October, is directed by China-born filmmaker Chloe Zhao, who came under attack from nationalistic social media accounts earlier this year after an old comment she made in an interview criticizing China as a “place where lies are everywhere” was resurfaced and went viral. The ensuing outrage resulted in the near total local censorship of Zhao’s historic best director Oscar win for Nomadland.

Shang-Chi, meanwhile, heralds the debut of Marvel’s first Asian superhero, played by China-born actor Simu Liu, with supporting performances from Chinese screen icons Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Michelle Yeoh. Much like Eternals, the local connections that might have seemed a boon instead have proved only a burden. Users of China’s social media services have lobbed criticism at the project for months because of the painful legacy surrounding the character of Fu Manchu, the villain who turns out to be Shang-Chi’s father in the original Marvel comics. Fu Manchu has been criticized for decades as a racist embodiment of the “yellow peril” stereotype. For the forthcoming film, Disney is known to have rewritten the character as Wenwu, aka “the Mandarin,” but some Chinese internet users have argued that the film should be boycotted on principle no matter how tenuous the historical connection.

“It’s become very easy to offend nationalist sentiments in China in general,” says Stan Rosen, a professor at USC who specializes in the Chinese film industry, “but whenever Hollywood makes a film involving Chinese culture, it really becomes a mine field.”

He adds: “Of course, no one has seen [Shang-Chi] yet, but the Chinese audience already feels that Hollywood is telling them, ‘We know how to make a superhero movie about Chinese culture better than you do’ — and so the knives are out.”

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[GeneChing]

I've seen the screener. Fu Manchu isn't even in this. And Tony Leung is fantastic as always - one of the most complex MCU villains so far.


Aug 18, 2021 11:46am PT
Marvel President Kevin Feige Addresses China’s Biggest ‘Shang-Chi’ Concerns (https://variety.com/2021/film/global/marvel-kevin-feige-shang-chi-1235043910/)

By Rebecca Davis
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/SBT-25882_R.jpg?resize=681,383
Jasin Boland / Courtesy of Marvel Studios
Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige addressed Chinese fans’ most pressing concerns about the upcoming “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” in a recent interview.

Feige held an exclusive 14-minute-long interview in English with the well-regarded veteran Chinese film critic Raymond Zhou on the day of the film’s U.S. red carpet premiere (it’s out widely on Sept. 3), which shone a spotlight on China’s biggest gripes so far about the film.

“Shang-Chi” doesn’t yet have a China release date, and it’s unclear whether it has formally passed censorship. Past franchise successes prove that crossing that hurdle into the world’s largest film market will of course be key to the title’s global gross.

One of the last major overseas trips Feige took before COVID-19 shutdowns was to Shanghai in 2019 for an “Avengers: Endgame” promotional event, he told Zhou, calling it “one of the biggest MCU fan events I’ve ever been [to].” The film opened in China two days before the U.S., and grossed $629 million there to become the country’s highest grossing foreign film of all time, and its sixth largest earner overall.

Marvel is clearly hoping that the franchise’s first Asian superhero will have the same box office appeal, despite some strong local concerns that have been brewing since the project was first announced.

Many Chinese viewers insist that any film based on comics featuring the archetypically stereotyped character Fu Manchu — who is Shang-Chi’s father and nemesis in the original comics — will turn out to be a racist depiction. Feige, however, explained that the character is “just one of the truths about the early comic books” but is not in the movie “in any way, shape or form” and is not a Marvel character.

He emphasized and reiterated the point a number of times.

“[Fu Manchu] is not a character we own or would ever want to own. It was changed in the comics many, many, many years ago. We never had any intention of [having him] in this movie,” he said. Later: “Definitively, Fu Manchu is not in this movie, is not Shang-Chi’s father, and again, is not even a Marvel character, and hasn’t been for decades.”

A second concern in China is that in the comics, Shang-Chi is at times portrayed as abandoning his Chinese roots to embrace the West, and in one plot line even goes so far as to kill his father.

“That’s certainly one of the elements we’ve changed,” Feige reassured. “All of our comics go back 60, 70, 80 years. Almost everything has happened in almost every comic, and we chose the elements that we like to turn into an MCU feature. So that story is not what this is about.”

The film actually tells the opposite story, he explained, depicting how Shang-Chi returns to engage with his father’s legacy after running away from it in his youth. He stressed: “That sense of running away…is presented as one of his flaws. It is a flaw to run away to the West and to hide from his legacy and his family — that’s how the movie is presented. And how he will face that and overcome that is part of what the story’s about.”

The framing is well-aimed. Chinese audiences in recent years have been particularly drawn to emotional stories about family without black-and-white battles of good against evil, attributes that helped shoot films like local animation “Ne Zha” and sci-fi spectacle “The Wandering Earth” to unexpected box office heights.

“Shang-Chi” ticks all those boxes, Feige said, describing the film’s story as one centred on the love, conflict and misunderstandings between a father and son, and unique in that there is no true villain.

Feige said Tony Leung, who plays the film’s ambiguous, flawed bad guy, is “the heart of the movie,” calling the Hong Kong icon “one of the greatest actors in the world.”

At one point, Zhou posed a question about the uncomfortable but widespread criticism in China that Simu Liu is not attractive or charismatic enough by local standards to carry the role, making the casting choice racist. As Zhou delicately put it, the decision has “caused a lot of misunderstandings among Chinese fans.”

Feige explained that many of the MCU’s origin stories for new characters featured lesser known or unknown actors who were right for the part and went on to stardom, citing Tom Hiddleston, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Holland, Chris Evans and even Robert Downey, Jr., whose casting sparked initial blowback.

The executive urged viewers to see the movie before making judgements.

“Let all the hard work that the performer does be the proof, and not just the announcement or the Google search when somebody learns their name,” he said.

The interview was seen locally as part successful charm offensive and part last-minute damage control. One film blogger deemed Feige “quite sincere,” with answers that had “basically no ambiguity or deliberate side-stepping.”

In a comment like over 3,000 times, a Weibo user wrote: “I was previously thinking about not seeing it, but this has finally dispelled my doubts; I feel like I can watch the film with ease.”

Others bristled that Feige only addressed the widespread Chinese concerns about “Shang-Chi” at the last minute, when its box office there appeared to potentially be in jeopardy.

As one Weibo user cynically commented: “To sum up: ‘We don’t want to lose the mainland China market.’”


Threads
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Shang-Chi-and-the-Legend-of-the-Ten-RingsShang-Chi-and-the-Legend-of-the-Ten-Rings (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71109-Shang-Chi-and-the-Legend-of-the-Ten-Rings)

[GeneChing]

This is what was feared when HK turned over to PRC in 97...


Aug 24, 2021 1:09am PT
Illegal Film Screenings to Be Punished With Three-Year Jail Terms Under Hong Kong Censorship Law (https://variety.com/2021/film/asia/hong-kong-censorship-law-jail-1235047547/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/cte_extreme-ends-cr-res.jpg?resize=681,383
Courtesy of Celestial Tiger Entertainment
Hong Kong is to introduce a new film censorship law that could send anyone responsible for illegal screenings to jail for up to three years. Offenders could also be liable to a HK$1 million ($128,000) fine.

The new law is intended to codify national security concerns that were introduced into the city’s film classification ordinance as recently as June.

The moves were announced by the government’s commerce secretary Edward Yau at a press conference on Tuesday.

As well as codifying the Film Censorship Authority’s powers and duties regarding national security, the new law will allow the government to appoint an official representative to the Board of Review and do away with non-official members.

It will also cancel a film distributor or exhibitor’s right to appeal against a board decision if the decision is made on national security grounds.

Although the government has said that the July 2021 National Security Law does not have retrospective effect, the new film censorship law appears to have retroactive impact and undo existing classifications of past titles.

It will “empower the Chief Secretary for Administration to direct the Film Censorship Authority to revoke certificates of approval or certificates of exemption previously issued for films if their exhibition would be contrary to the interests of national security.”

That means that films such “Ten Years,” a dystopian portmanteau film made in 2015 that predicted how everyday Hong Kong life would under the yoke of mainland Chinese rule, could soon be banned.
Hong Kong has witnessed unprecedented social and political turmoil since mid-2019 when the government attempted to introduce a law allowing extradition to mainland China. After a year of civil disobedience and violent clashes between police and pro-democracy forces the mainland government silenced protests by injecting the National Security Law into an annex of Hong Kong’s mini-constitution.

Since that time, the city’s election and education systems have been upended and a trades union disbanded.

In the entertainment and media sector, pro-Beijing media have pressurized exhibitors to cancel screenings of a documentary about the 2019-20 protests, the public broadcaster RTHK has been neutered and the city’s leading pro-democracy newspaper has been bankrupted.

The film censorship law will receive a first and second reading in Hong Kong’s Legislative Council on Wednesday next week (Sept. 1). Opposition politicians have all resigned, meaning that the pro-government majority is certain to get its way.

Yau said the law was necessary for “more effective fulfilment of the duty to safeguard national security as required by the Law of the People’s Republic of China on Safeguarding National Security in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, as well as preventing and suppressing acts or activities that may endanger national security.”

threads
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Hong-Kong-protests (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?23536-Hong-Kong-protests)

[GeneChing]

Unfortunately the key element - the graphs - won't cut&paste here easily. You'll just have to go to the original article.


Aug 25, 2021 11:05am PT
Why Hollywood Movies are Being Squeezed Out in China, and What Happens Next (https://variety.com/2021/global/asia/hollywood-china-box-office-eternals-shang-chi-2021-1235045498/)

By Patrick Frater
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/a-quiet-place-sound-design.jpg
Jonny Cournoyer
Hollywood film franchises such as “xXx,” “Warcraft” and “Resident Evil” used to be largely sustained by their box office performance in China, which significantly exceeded their North American hauls and drove global grosses. Frequently, Hollywood titles would dominate the Chinese box office charts during most weeks.

But in recent years, that tide has been turning. In 2018, Hollywood topped the local B.O. over 25 weekends, closely followed by Chinese-made winners, which conquered 22 weekends. Now, the studios are struggling for traction in what has become the world’s single largest theatrical market.

In the first eight months of 2021, Hollywood titles have been chart toppers on just eight occasions, driven by an ageing “Fast and the Furious” franchise, and over two weeks by a rereleased “Avatar.” Hollywood’s share of the China box office market in 2021 has collapsed to a shocking 9.5%, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway.

This year, there are only two U.S. pictures in China’s top-15 rankings. In contrast, the top two films at the global box office so far this year are China’s “Hi Mom” on $822 million, and “Detective Chinatown 3” on $686 million, ahead of “F9: The Fast Saga” with $681 million.



“[COVID aside] this year would have been a difficult time for import films and Hollywood in particular,” says Artisan Gateway principal Rance Pow. “The Chinese films that have been popular have become very popular and on top by quite some distance.”

But it wasn't always this way. The modern-day Chinese film industry is still relatively young and grew up alongside a Hollywood market share that reached 50% in some years.

However, the government has done its best to keep U.S. titles in check. A system of import controls exercises quota allocations; blackout periods often cordon off three or four prime seasons per year for Chinese-language film releases; and the use of a censorship approval system diminishes pre-release marketing to just a few weeks.

There hasn't been a single significant Hollywood release in China since “A Quiet Place Part II” on May 28 and "Luca" on Aug. 20. Meanwhile, Disney-Marvel titles haven't been released in China since “Avengers: Endgame” in April 2019. In fact, “Black Widow” still remains without a release permit in China.

Since the pandemic struck, the supply of Hollywood movies into China has been thin and sharply out of synch with China’s V-shaped economic recovery which started in mid-2020. Industry sources have told Variety that revenue share quota slots remain available — an almost unprecedented situation.

In a late July filing, IMAX China indicated that audiences have returned to Chinese theaters, and particularly IMAX theaters, in numbers approximating pre-pandemic attendance levels, but they're there for Chinese-language films and the handful of Hollywood films that were available. "The delay of certain Hollywood film release dates impacted IMAX's Hollywood films box office,” reads the filing.

However, the release hiatus, combined with the studios’ experimentation with day-and-date theatrical-streaming releases, has caused all U.S. summer titles to be heavily pirated. The weak $5 million debut of “Luca” is a prime example.

Changing local tastes drive support for Chinese fare
Just as concerning from a Hollywood point of view have been changes in audience structure and taste. It's widely believed that as Chinese exhibitors have built theaters in smaller towns and cities, they have addressed a more local market and diluted the population that's likely to watch foreign movies. At the same time, Chinese movie-making has become more sophisticated, more blockbuster-driven and backed by bigger budgets. Prodded by central government, mainland Chinese filmmakers have reached into previously off-limit genres.

That means Hollywood is no longer the only purveyor of well-packaged action and sci-fi movies, or franchises built around other forms of proven IP, such as comics, TV or streaming series and games.

Concurrently, China’s 'main melody' titles — nationalistic fare that emphasizes Socialist values — have also raised their game. Flooding out from private sector studios and employing established filmmakers, many are premium productions with stars and stellar production values that deliver real audience appeal.

Ultimately, whether or not Hollywood’s recent troubles are COVID-related or more systemic, U.S. studios have struggled to participate in the rebound that got underway in July 2020 after China’s cinemas had been closed for five and a half months.

The recovery accelerated in September when cinema capacity restrictions were eased from 50% to 75%, and China became the first theatrical market to reach operational normality, according to U.K.-based researcher Gower Street Analytics. Activity was sustained at a high level until June 2021, when attendance levels began to fall noticeably short of 2019 levels, due in part to dwindling Hollywood fare, an over-saturation of political movies and movie theater restrictions.

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Hi-Mom-Chinese-film-cr-Copy-res.jpg
China's “Hi Mom” is topping the global box office with $822 million.
Beijing Culture
Politics will impact next chapter
What happens next depends on a series of political factors. The already unusually long summer blackout period could be stretched until after the Oct. 1 National Day festivities. That would have the effect of squeezing any remaining Hollywood films into the last three months of the year.

Movies that may be at risk include “The Eternals," directed by Chloé Zhao, who was branded a traitor for her past comments; “Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings," where Disney may not have done enough to diffuse charges of racism; “Space Jam: A New Legacy," because American basketball continues to be a sensitive subject following an NBA official’s 2019 comments on Hong Kong; and “Top Gun," which is seen as promoting the U.S. military.

The political standoff between China and the U.S. has already gummed up film industry negotiations. Now there's the possibility that, in a tit-for-tat move following U.S. moves against ZTE, TikTok and Huawei, China may be deliberately hobbling one of America’s biggest export industries. Several seemingly uncontroversial Hollywood titles are without release approvals or dates, including “Jungle Cruise” and “The Suicide Squad.” Sci-fi spectacular “Dune” has the advantage of being backed by the Wanda-owned Legendary Entertainment, but some online commentators are still cool about its prospects.

Possibly the most complicated calculation is whether policy or economics will guide the Chinese government’s thinking about the film industry through the last third of the year.

The National Radio & Television Administration is understood to have set a box office target of RMB60 billion ($9.23 billion at current exchange rates) for this year. That's largely the same as 2018’s score of RMB60.7 billion and the RMB64.3 billion achieved in 2019, when Chinese-language titles earned a combined RMB41.2 billion.

Since June, cumulative national box office is now running some 24% below 2019 levels, at $4.93 billion to Aug. 15. With new outbreaks of COVID-19 prompting reinstated cinema restrictions and the postponement of a couple of major local titles, that target looks to be almost out of reach.

Regulators will have to decide whether to help China’s cinema chains by allowing more Hollywood imports, or whether, in this politically sensitive year, the U.S. should be kept at bay, even if that means a box office stumble.

Such a scenario would, in turn, raise new questions in Hollywood: if China becomes an unreliable partner, why would Chinese factors need to be taken into consideration at the greenlight stage?

[YinOrYan]

Unfortunately the key element - the graphs - won't cut&paste here easily. You'll just have to go to the original article.

...or looky here:

[GeneChing]

Thanks for the assist!

[GeneChing]

How Hollywood Sold Out to China (https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2021/09/how-hollywood-sold-out-to-china/620021/)
A culture of acquiescing to Beijing’s censors is now the norm, and there’s little sign of it changing.

By Shirley Li
https://cdn.theatlantic.com/thumbor/SWNUhGunKFkAac5dsvKXoywDqhE=/0x0:2500x1406/1952x1098/media/img/mt/2021/09/GettyImages_952278622/original.jpg
Wang Zhao / AFP / Getty
7:00 AM ET
SHARE
Chloé zhao, the director of Nomadland, is new Hollywood royalty. In April, she made history as the first woman of color to win Best Director at the Oscars. In November, her big-budget Marvel movie, Eternals, will arrive in theaters. She commands so much admiration from the industry right now that she gets away with showing up to the red carpet of a film premiere in jeans.

Zhao was, for a time, just as warmly regarded in China. Born in Beijing, she also has ties to Chinese entertainment royalty: Her stepmother, Song Dandan, is one of the most celebrated comic actresses in the country. And Zhao’s success in Hollywood made her the model of a crossover artist, bringing Chinese sensibilities to American filmmaking. In March, the Communist Party–owned newspaper Global Times anointed her “the pride of China.”

But then an eight-year-old interview in which Zhao called the country a place “where there are lies everywhere” spread online. Beijing responded by deleting social-media celebrations of her Oscar win and canceling the release of Nomadland. Eternals, which should have been a shoo-in to screen across China, now faces a potential ban. Swiftly and quietly, Zhao’s native country appears to have disowned her—at least, for now. (Zhao declined to comment on the matter.)

Hers is a cautionary tale—and a common one these days. No matter their clout in Hollywood, filmmakers and actors have always been subject to bosses who decide which movies get to soar at the box office and which are left to languish. Now, more than ever before, that boss is Beijing.

In 2020, the Chinese film market officially surpassed North America’s as the world’s biggest box office, all but ensuring that Hollywood studios will continue to do everything possible for access to the country. This also means China will assert itself more aggressively to control Hollywood. The country, which already places a quota on the number of foreign films that can be screened every year, banned them for nearly two months this summer because of celebrations for the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party’s founding.

Meanwhile, China’s film industry now churns out its own big-budget franchises, lessening the country’s dependence on the next Fast & Furious installment. Though some American filmmakers, such as Quentin Tarantino and Judd Apatow, have pushed back on China’s demands, they are the rare exceptions willing and able to weather any potential repercussions. Instead, the film industry has regularly shaped its productions to please Beijing; whenever Hollywood fails, it either issues self-flagellatory public apologies or remains silent on the matter altogether. (Universal, Disney, and the other major Hollywood studios I reached out to for this story all declined to comment or did not respond to my requests.)

With studios now implementing their own limits on free speech, America’s supposedly gutsy, creative entertainment industry is at rapid risk of making preemptive self-censorship the standard. During the blacklist era of the 1940s and ’50s, Hollywood studios infamously submitted to domestic political pressure. Today, film censorship—the rise of which you can literally watch on screen—has become one of the most visible examples of American businesses bending their values to satisfy China, and a worrying harbinger for any industry that wants access to the country’s consumers. China has simply become too lucrative for Hollywood to resist.
continued next post

[GeneChing]

https://cdn.theatlantic.com/thumbor/pjzV-rPXtMyBPK_Kb--psV1Th34=/0x0:2500x1406/1310x736/media/img/posts/2021/09/h_15483490/original.jpg
Gilles Sabrié / The New York Times / Redux
What critics might call censorship, Hollywood studios might label a market-entry strategy. The phenomenon has long been part of the global film industry. Post–World War II West German audiences saw a different version of Casablanca than the rest of the world. Last Tango in Paris, with its notoriously explicit sex scenes, was edited before it could be released in Britain and barred from being shown in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. Three Nordic countries placed an age restriction on the film E.T. in 1982 after child psychologists accused the film of portraying adults as “enemies of children.”

Thus, when China re-allowed Hollywood movies in the late 1980s and ’90s (they were banned during the Cultural Revolution) as long as it could select and edit the ones it wanted, American companies didn’t see red flags. “It’s all a version of self-regulation we’ve been going through for decades,” says Russell Schwartz, a former president of marketing at New Line Cinema and at Relativity Media, who oversaw campaigns for the Lord of the Rings trilogy and the Rush Hour sequels.

When China began seriously investing in—not just importing, but co-producing or financing—Hollywood films in the 2000s, the country represented pure opportunity. “Everybody was doing backflips” to get their films screened, Schwartz told me. The Chinese government, which oversees the country’s entertainment industry, imposes a quota on international movies—34 a year, occasionally a couple extra—and determines release dates, how much advertising a film receives, and the number of theaters in which it can screen. Foreign studios, Schwartz told me, lobby fiercely for their titles to be allowed entry.

Hollywood’s admittance into China might have appeared to be an opportunity for America to promote Western ideals in an authoritarian country. However, according to Wendy Su, an associate professor of media and cultural studies at UC Riverside and the author of China’s Encounter With Global Hollywood, Hollywood only ever had one, all-encompassing objective: “the vast Chinese market and the potential for greater profits,” she wrote over email. The country had been “extraordinarily underscreened” only two decades ago, Schwartz noted, but built theaters so quickly that it now boasts more than 75,500 screens, according to a report released in February (the U.S. had roughly 41,000 as of 2020). Films that underperform in the States can thus recuperate their losses abroad.

Today, China’s box office doesn’t just represent opportunity for Hollywood; it can mean the difference between a studio’s success and failure. This has resulted in “anticipatory self-censorship” by the American film industry, says James Tager, the research director at PEN America, a nonprofit that promotes free expression, and the lead author of the organization’s exhaustive 2020 censorship report. Besides casting mainland-Chinese actors and shooting on location in China, the study says, studios even have regulators visit their sets—as was reportedly the case for Iron Man 3. (Marvel and Disney did not respond to a request for comment.)

The Chinese government encourages this chilling effect by setting confusing, ever-shifting expectations, Tager told me. Time-travel narratives like Back to the Future were deemed “frivolous” and disrespectful of history—especially if such stories suggested the ability to alter reality. But 2012’s Looper, featuring scenes shot in Shanghai, with dialogue depicting China as a representation of the future, made it past censors. A culture of trying to predict the country’s needs is now the norm: Stories portraying Chinese characters as antagonists or featuring disagreement with Beijing in regions such as Tibet, Taiwan, and Xinjiang have been assumed off-limits. But China has also banned scenes from Bohemian Rhapsody, apparently for depicting same-sex relationships, and prohibited Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest altogether for including ghosts and cannibalism.

Still, obvious pandering to Beijing can backfire in China. Audiences call a Chinese actor who appears in a Hollywood movie but plays a minimal role a hua ping, or a “flower vase”: nothing more than a recognizable face lazily included to help sell tickets. As the country’s own filmmaking industry has grown stronger, Chinese moviegoers have become more discerning about which foreign films to watch, and Hollywood’s share of the Chinese box office has lessened. Though action-thrillers such as Ready Player One fill seats in China, comedies still struggle to connect. “Many prospective clients have misinformed notions that China can be a savior market if you can only gain access,” Rance Pow, the CEO of Artisan Gateway, a consulting firm focused on Asia’s film industry, told me over email. “In fact … China can be a challenging, sometimes unforgiving environment for foreign fare.”

If china’s apparent crackdown on Chloé Zhao’s work is a cautionary tale, then the case of John Cena is a tragicomic one. The WWE star turned actor appeared in this summer’s ​F9, the latest Fast & Furious blockbuster, and Universal Pictures jumped through all the right hoops to ensure its success. The film, co-produced with the state-owned China Film Group Corporation, premiered in China as well as several other places more than a month ahead of its stateside release—the longest lag ever for a Hollywood movie and a date seemingly chosen to accommodate the CCP’s centenary plans.

Shortly after the film came out, Cena, who stars as the beefy villain in F9, posted a puzzling video to the Chinese social-media platform Weibo in which he awkwardly apologizes over and over in stilted Mandarin for “my mistake.” While Cena doesn’t name his offense, he had called Taiwan a country—a characterization the Chinese government adamantly opposes—during a press interview not long before the video. Cena’s apology made him a darling to Chinese nationalists and a punching bag for U.S. media. But the contrition paid off: F9 grossed $136 million in China its first weekend, nearly double its North American opening. Universal never confirmed what precipitated Cena’s video, and Cena hasn’t revisited the subject since. The only point of it, apparently, was to appease Beijing and move on.

Supplication, then silence: That’s consistent with Hollywood’s larger publicity strategy when the hint of a China-related scandal arises. “The reason why no one wants to talk about this is because there’s no advantages to talking about this,” Tager told me. “They want this issue to go away.”

According to analysts, studios are in a lose-lose position. Aynne Kokas, an associate professor of media studies at the University of Virginia and the author of Hollywood Made in China, explains that if Hollywood were to acknowledge self-censorship, the media blowback in the West would be significant, and China’s risk-averse government might blacklist Hollywood films to minimize attention. At the same time, she told me, studios might draw scrutiny from certain American legislators, harming their reputation at home. But Hollywood won’t stop caving to demands from Beijing, because that’s simply where the industry’s growth is. No other market, especially during the pandemic, comes close. “So in some ways it’s a problem with the American model,” Kokas said. “Can you make a product that is profitable without being in the Chinese market?”

The answer, it seems, is no. So much of Hollywood’s business today resides on shaky ground. The pandemic’s effects, the streaming wars, the consolidation of studios, the expansion of franchises into theme-park attractions—they’re all unpredictable variables. Yet even as China’s investment in Hollywood has slowed amid a trade war with the U.S., Chinese moviegoers provide a rare constant for studios: a market for guaranteed profit, as long as Beijing approves. Tager suggested to me that perhaps Hollywood studios could band together to rewrite the rules, but few experts offered measures that would fundamentally change an asymmetrical relationship between the world’s largest producer of films and its most lucrative audience. In the end, Schwartz observed, “I don’t think we’ll ever really draw a line in the sand.”


Shirley Li is a staff writer at The Atlantic​, where she covers culture.

threads
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Eternals (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71418-The-Eternals)

[GeneChing]

Marvel's 'Shang-Chi' was made with China in mind. Here's why Beijing doesn't like it. (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/china/marvel-s-shang-chi-was-made-china-mind-here-s-n1280571)
"Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings" is the latest movie to run into trouble in the country as nationalism and U.S.-China tensions rise.
https://media-cldnry.s-nbcnews.com/image/upload/t_fit-2000w,f_auto,q_auto:best/newscms/2021_38/3506828/210919-simu-liu-shang-chi-jm-1016.jpg
Simu Liu in "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings."Marvel Studios
Oct. 3, 2021, 1:30 AM PDT
By Rhea Mogul
HONG KONG — David Tse recalls being overcome with pride as he walked out of a British movie theater after having watched "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings," Marvel's latest superhero film.

"Our community has finally arrived in the West," Tse, a British Chinese actor and writer, said by telephone from Birmingham, England. "Every Chinese person around the world should be immensely proud of Shang-Chi."

The film, Marvel's first with a predominantly Asian cast, has been a hit with global audiences, having earned more at U.S. theaters than any other movie during the coronavirus pandemic and grossed more than $366 million worldwide since it was released early last month.

But despite its box office success and the overwhelmingly positive reaction of Asian communities worldwide, it isn't playing on a single screen in mainland China, which last year overtook North America as the world's biggest movie market. It's the latest film to run into trouble in the country as nationalism and U.S.-Chinese tensions rise.

From the beginning, "Shang-Chi" was made with China in mind. Much of the film's dialogue is in Mandarin, and the cast includes some of Asian cinema's biggest names, including Michelle Yeoh and the Hong Kong superstar Tony Leung, making his Hollywood film debut.

https://media-cldnry.s-nbcnews.com/image/upload/t_fit-360w,f_auto,q_auto:best/newscms/2021_34/3501369/210824-simu-liu-marvel-movie-ac-1030p.jpg
Marvel's first movie with a predominantly Asian cast has been a hit with global audiences. Courtesy of Marvel
Simu Liu, a Chinese-born Canadian actor who also starred in the Netflix sitcom "Kim's Convenience," plays Shang-Chi, a reluctant martial arts warrior forced to confront his father. The film has been widely praised as a major step forward as Hollywood tries to improve representation of Asians and Asian Americans.

"Finally we see a strong character that isn't stereotyped the way we have been for generations," Tse said. "Our young people are desperate for more of them."

"Shang-Chi" hasn't gotten the same welcome in China, where movies are strictly censored and the number of foreign releases each year is limited. That hasn't stopped Marvel in the past — in 2019, "Avengers: Endgame" earned $629 million from mainland Chinese audiences, more than any other foreign film in history.

Officials haven't said why "Shang-Chi" has no release date, and the propaganda department of China's ruling Communist Party, which regulates the country's film and TV industry, didn't respond to a request for comment.

Experts point to the deterioration of U.S.-China relations, rising Chinese nationalism and the character's racist comic book past.

Rife with stereotypes

Marvel debuted the Shang-Chi character in 1973 amid growing American interest in martial arts movies. The early Shang-Chi comics were rife with stereotypes about Asians — the characters were portrayed in unnatural yellow tones. Shang-Chi's father, a power-hungry villain named Fu Manchu, has been criticized as a symbol of "yellow peril," a xenophobic ideology originating in the 19th century in which Asians, especially Chinese, were viewed as a threat to Western existence.

Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige has emphasized that Fu Manchu is no longer a character in Marvel comics and that Shang-Chi's father in the film, played by Leung, is a completely different character named Xu Wenwu. But for some the connection persists.

"Chinese audiences cannot accept a prejudiced character from 100 years ago is still appearing in a new Marvel film," the Beijing-based film critic Shi Wenxue told the Global Times, a state-backed nationalist tabloid.

Liu, 32, who emigrated to Canada with his parents in the 1990s, has also drawn public ire over past comments critical of his country of birth.

In a 2016 Twitter post, he described Chinese government censorship as "really immature and out of touch."

The next year, in an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. that has since been taken down, Liu described China as a "third world" country where people were "dying of starvation" when he and his parents left. A screenshot of his comments has circulated on Weibo, a popular social networking platform in China, with one user commenting: "Then why does he play a Chinese character?"

Michael Berry, director of the UCLA Center for Chinese Studies, said Liu's comments had been "taken out of context and politicized."

"Once a cyberattack is waged against a film or individual in China, there are usually a series of talking points that are manufactured and then leveraged to take advantage of rising nationalist sentiment," he said.

'Reclaiming our culture'

The anger over Liu's comments echoes that of an earlier episode involving Chloé Zhao, the Beijing-born director of "Nomadland," who made history this year when she became the first woman of color to win the Academy Award for best director.

"Nomadland" had been scheduled for a limited mainland release, but then a 2013 interview with Filmmaker magazine resurfaced in which Zhao described China as "a place where there are lies everywhere." She was targeted by online commenters who accused her of smearing the nation, and the film was never shown.

"Eternals," a coming Marvel film directed by Zhao, could also be denied a release date in mainland China.

Berry said the treatment of Liu and Zhao was a "great tragedy," describing them as China's "best hope for better cross-cultural understanding between China and the West."

Many moviegoers elsewhere in the region have celebrated "Shang-Chi" for promoting that understanding.

https://media-cldnry.s-nbcnews.com/image/upload/t_fit-560w,f_auto,q_auto:best/newscms/2021_34/3501361/210824-simu-liu-marvel-movie-ac-931p.jpg
Officials have not said why "Shang-Chi" has no release date, and the propaganda department of China's ruling Communist Party, which regulates the country's film and TV industry, did not respond to a request for comment. Courtesy of Marvel
Adrian Hong, 22, a student who has seen the movie twice in Hong Kong, which has its own film regulator, said it spoke volumes about the "beauty and grace of Chinese culture."

"The beauty of martial art, the concept of yin and yang, the incredible mythical creatures all add to the film," he said.

Some commenters on Weibo have also questioned the mainland government's apparent decision not to show the film.

"Why do some people say 'Shang-Chi' offends China?" one user asked. "The movie doesn't offend China, but promotes traditional Chinese culture instead."

For Tse, the actor and writer, "Shang-Chi" is all the more important because of the rampant anti-Asian racism, discrimination and violence unleashed by the pandemic.

"This is a pushback for all the Asian hate crimes against us. It's an answer to all the bigots who have been against us for decades," he said. "'Shang-Chi' is us reclaiming our culture. It says globally, culturally, this is a new tide of history."


Threads
Shang-Chi-and-the-Legend-of-the-Ten-Rings/ (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71109-Shang-Chi-and-the-Legend-of-the-Ten-Rings/)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

China’s ‘Battle at Lake Changjin’ beats James Bond at box office with $203 million (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/chinas-battle-lake-changjin-beats-james-bond-box-office-203-million-rcna2589)
“No Time to Die,” the latest movie in the James Bond franchise, made $119 million at the global box office last weekend.
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Moviegoers arrive to watch “The Battle At Lake Changjin" on Saturday, in Wuhan, China.Getty Images
Oct. 5, 2021, 2:30 AM PDT / Updated Oct. 5, 2021, 3:13 AM PDT
By Variety
China’s “The Battle at Lake Changjin” was the highest grossing film anywhere in the world over the past weekend, with a $203 million haul.

That score was fractionally lower than the combined total earned by “No Time to Die” ($119 million in international markets) and by “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” ($90.2 million in North America).

The film was the far away winner in mainland China, where it was released on Thursday, a day ahead of the October 1, National Day holiday. Over four days on release, it earned $234 million, according to consultancy Artisan Gateway.

Additional data from local provider Ent Group showed that “Battle” enjoyed a massive 157,000 screenings per day and was watched by 25.5 million ticket buyers between Friday and Sunday.

That put it ahead of “My Country, My Parents,” which earned $70.6 million over the weekend proper and a “Venom”-like $90.4 million total over four days.

Both titles are examples of the patriotic triumphalism that has come to typify the Chinese box office since it re-opened, post pandemic in July last year, and both capitalize on the sentiment stirred up around the annual celebrations of the country’s birth, some 72 years ago.

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‘The Battle at Lake Changjin’ was the highest grossing film anywhere in the world over the past weekend, with a $203 million haul.Getty Images
“Changjin” earned $12.9 million of its total from Imax giant screens, making it the third biggest Imax opening weekend of all time behind sci-fi title “The Wandering Earth” and Chinese New Year comedy “Detective Chinatown 3.”

Made with a production budget reported to be over $200 million, the film boasts three of Greater China’s top directors: Chen Kaige, Tsui Hark and Dante Lam.

It is an epic war film praising the triumphs of Chinese soldiers fighting American-led United Nations forces in the early days of the Korean War (1950-1953). China portrays its involvement in the war as an act of self-defense and one of support for North Korean leader Kim Il-sung. In Chinese, it is called the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea.

The film was produced by Bona Film Group and stars Wu Jing, star and director of the blockbuster “Wolf Warrior” war films, and pop idol turned actor Jackson Yee. (Wu also stars in and is credited as one of four co-directors on “My Country, My Parents”.)

In a very distant third place, Chinese-made animation “Dear Tutu: Operation T-Rex” earned $3.5 million over three days.

Artisan Gateway shows the weekend aggregate to have been $295 million or some RMB1.9 billion.

That advances the year-to-date box office in China to $5.31 billion, a figure that is 27 percent below the same point in pre-pandemic 2019. Over the seven day National Holiday period in 2019, box office takings reached RMB4.5 billion.

threads
The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72154-The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
No-Time-to-Die (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71114-No-Time-to-Die)

[GeneChing]

Nov 21, 2021 11:10pm PT
China Box Office: ‘Be Somebody’ Powers up Weekend as ‘Lake Changjin’ Is Poised for Record (https://variety.com/2021/film/asia/china-box-office-weekend-be-somebody-1235117164/)

By Patrick Frater
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Be-Somebody-cr.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
Maoyan Pictures
Crime comedy film “Be Somebody” expanded its box office take by 20% in its second weekend of release in China and joined in a 49% surge in nationwide gross revenues.

Nationwide box office climbed from $43.1 million in the previous weekend to $64.3 million between Friday and Sunday. For all that, China’s year to date box office haul is now 26% below that of pre-COVID 2019.

Staying on top of the chart for a second session, “Be Somebody” earned $23.9 million over the weekend, according to data from Artisan Gateway. That gives it a 10-day total of $60.3 million.

The movie directed by Liu Xunzi Mo is a send-up of crime drama tropes, making fun of the genre through the story of a group of filmmakers trying to please a wealthy patron by creating a sufficiently blood-thirsty crime thriller when things begin to go awry in the mansion where they are cloistered to work on the project. It stars Zheng Yin (“Goodbye Mr. Loser”), Deng Jiajia, Yu Entai, and Yang Haoyu (“The Wandering Earth”). It was produced by Maoyan Pictures.

In second place with a strong $20.2 million opening weekend was “The Door Lock,” a suspense horror film about a woman living alone in a big city. Produced by Hengye Pictures, the film is a Chinese remake of a 2018 Korean film of the same title. The Korean film was itself a remake of a 2011 Spanish film “Sleep Tight,” but told from a different perspective. The Chinese retread stars Bai Baihe, Adam Fan (aka Fan Chengcheng) and Cici Wang.

Third place over the weekend belonged to Chinese-made war film “Railway Heroes,” which earned $9.6 million over the weekend. Produced by Huayi Bros., the film is directed by Yang Feng (“The Coldest City”) and stars the evergreen Zhang Hanyu in a WWII tale of Chinese volunteers who band together to destroy Japanese military supply lines.

The total for “Heroes” is modest compared with that of “The Battle at Lake Changjin,” the Korean War-set actioner that placed fourth over the weekend with an incremental take of $3.8 million. The weekend take lifts its mainland Chinese cumulative since Sept. 30 to $888 million. That score is now the biggest by any film this year, overtaking Chinese New Year breakout hit “Hi, Mom.”

Local data sources, quoting box office in Chinese currency, also put “The Battle at Lake Changjin” within RMB3 million ($489,000) of the RMB5.689 billion achieved by China’s all-time, all-comers box office record holder “Wolf Warriors II” in 2017.



threads
Chollywood-rising/ (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising/)
The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72154-The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin)

[GeneChing]

Dec 13, 2021 3:50am PT
China Box Office: ‘Schemes in Antiques’ Conspires to Hold Top Spot (https://variety.com/2021/film/news/schemes-in-antiques-week-two-china-box-office-1235131761/)

By Rebecca Davis
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/schemes-Cropped.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
"Schemes in Antiques"
Chinese action-adventure title “Schemes in Antiques” conspired to hold its own at the top of the China box office with a $14.7 million second weekend, having opened first last week with a solid $25.6 million three-day debut.

Originally set to premiere in April, the tale of intrigue around real and counterfeit artifacts from Hong Kong director Derek Kwok Chi-kin (“Wukong”) has now grossed $52 million (RMB331 million) of a projected $66.6 million, according to data from Maoyan. Produced by Hong Kong-based Emperor Motion Pictures, it stars fan favorite Ge You alongside Lei Jiayin, Li Xian, and Xin Zhilei.

“Schemes” maneuvered ahead of second place comedic thriller “Be Somebody,” which grossed a further $9.85 million in its fifth weekend to bring its current cume up to $133 million.

Once again this week, a new rom-com took third: a film whose Chinese name translates to “We Who Have Loved Before.” The tear-jerking first feature from newcomer Zhang Xiaolei grossed $3.55 million, far less than first and second place.

That the top three films of the weekend look so very much like they did last week — the fresher “Schemes,” followed by “Be Somebody” and a $3 million debut of an innocuous, flash-in-the-pan rom-com trailing far behind — is an indication of how stagnant China’s release schedule is at the moment without new major blockbuster releases.

Viewers were thirsty enough for new content that the upcoming animation “I Am What I Am” came in third off pre-sales, ahead of largely-exhausted war epic “The Battle at Lake Changjin,” which has been in theaters for 72 days since September. The former is set to release Dec. 17, but already grossed $2.33 million this weekend.

Directed by Wuhan native Sun Haipeng (“Kung Food”), the boldly colored tale tells the story of a young boy and his rag-tag band of companions who dream of winning the country’s biggest lion dance competition with the help of a former star dancer.

This week, “Battle” earned a further $1.44 million, bringing its cume up to $903 million.

Meanwhile, “Oh! My Gran” — the first Korean film to be released in China in six years — continues to fare poorly, with hardly any allotted screenings (an average of 0.4% of total nationwide screenings each day). It has grossed just $394,000 (RMB2.5 million) so far since its Dec. 3. debut, and currently ranks outside the top 20 films at the box office.

threads
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising/)
The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72154-The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin)
I Am What I Am (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72211-I-Am-What-I-Am)

[GeneChing]

This Year, Hollywood’s China Relationship Finally Unraveled (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/hollywoods-china-relationship-finally-unraveled-1235062742/)
It doesn’t matter how accommodating the industry may be — the next phase of the Xi Jinping era may be defined by less space for Western content.

BY TATIANA SIEGEL, PATRICK BRZESKI
DECEMBER 20, 2021 5:00AM
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/43rep_china_MAIN.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
THR ILLUSTRATION / ADOBE STOCK
In 2014, when Warner Bros. drafted LeBron James to star in its Space Jam sequel, the film was tailored to appeal above all else to the mighty Chinese market. After all, James was a huge commodity in the basketball-obsessed country, where his signature Nike sneakers are made. Along the way, the future Hall of Famer avoided poking the China bear, even if it meant drawing outrage when he criticized Houston Rockets GM Daryl Morey in 2019 for tweeting his support for Hong Kong protesters, calling him “misinformed” — a notable move given James’ vocal stance on police brutality issues and former President Trump’s so-called Muslim travel ban. At the time, videos of police crackdowns on Hong Kong’s pro-Democracy movement were circulating widely while it was well reported that more than 1 million Uighur Muslims were being held in internment camps.

Despite attempts to make it past China’s censors, Space Jam: A New Legacy never received a release in China this summer and scored just $162.8 million worldwide — a so-so figure even given the coronavirus pandemic. Still, Space Jam wasn’t alone. Disney received the same cold shoulder when it came to its Marvel tentpoles Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and The Eternals, films that were built around Chinese talent in order to make a giant showing in the market. But to no avail. Neither film was given a release in the country that continues to take heat for reported human rights abuses. Hollywood’s silence on those abuses has become deafening as other industries and entities have begun to confront China.

In fact, 2021 — with its diminishing economic returns in the country — might mark the year that finally cooled the Hollywood-China romance. “I think we’re still feeling our way through that [new paradigm],” WarnerMedia Studios and Networks Group chair and CEO Ann Sarnoff told THR, in a wide-ranging interview in October, in regard to Space Jam and the dearth of Hollywood tentpoles getting a bow in China. “Obviously there’s been a lot of geopolitical meta issues happening with changes of our government and trying to figure out what the new relationship’s going to be with the Biden administration. China’s clearly building its own local theatrical business. The numbers are very large, and we would like to believe we’re going to be a big part of their future. But we’re honestly taking it one movie at a time. I’m not making any grand predictions because I don’t know, but it’s something we’re very, very aware of and front burner because when you do your ultimates and your green lights, China was a big chunk of it.”

The reversal of fortunes in China has begun to accelerate in the past year. In 2021, just 25 U.S. movies were released theatrically in the country, many of which were minor indie titles instead of studio tentpoles. By contrast, some 45 Hollywood movies were shown on Chinese screens in 2019. That is forcing the major studios to pivot on their China ambitions, mostly because there is little to no growth to be attained in the country in the current climate. U.S.-China diplomatic relations simply have deteriorated to such an extent that it no longer matters how accommodatingly Hollywood comports itself in the market — the next phase of the Xi Jinping era is likely to be defined by less space for Western cultural content.

Despite China’s success in keeping COVID-19 cases close to zero, the theatrical film market is still far from whole. As of Dec. 13, China’s total box office earnings in 2021 were $7.05 billion, down 26.2 percent from $9.56 billion during the same stretch in 2019. In the past, whenever multiplexes needed a sales boost, regulators would simply turn on the tap of Hollywood releases to juice sales, even if that meant releasing more than the 34 U.S. revenue-sharing titles Beijing was required to allow into the market under a past trade agreement. That hasn’t happened this year. Instead, bankable Hollywood titles have sat on the shelf because of perceived political slights or for no perceptible reason at all. Among them: Black Widow, Venom: Let There Be Carnage and, now, potentially, Spider-Man: No Way Home.

At the same time, Hollywood has lost any semblance of a moral high ground. It has been lost on few that the industry remained mum when global superstar Fan Bingbing went missing in 2018 (including her agency, CAA). By contrast, the Women’s Tennis Association this month decided to pull all tournaments in China following a similar disappearance of tennis star Peng Shuai. (Some fear the Chinese doubles champion may be in some sort of detention after making allegations of sexual assault against a former Communist Party leader.)

“As Hollywood’s risk-reward calculus for China starts to get muddier and muddier, there’s a move for an entity, whether it’s a celebrity, athlete or company, to essentially do what Muhammad Ali did, which is to take a direct hit, short-term, on revenue but longterm create a brand that’s bigger than what they were originally known for,” says Blockers producer Chris Fenton, whose 2020 book, Feeding the Dragon: Inside the Trillion Dollar Dilemma Facing Hollywood, the NBA, & American Business, explored the China minefield.

Boston Celtics center Enes Kanter Freedom, for one, has seized that opportunity, blasting Xi for the country’s treatment of Muslims and calling out James for looking the other way. “Money over Morals for the ‘King,’” Kanter Freedom tweeted Nov. 18 before a Celtics-Lakers game. “Sad & disgusting how these athletes pretend they care about social justice. They really do ‘shut up & dribble’ when Big Boss says so. Did you educate yourself about the slave labor that made your shoes or is that not part of your research?” On Dec. 14, Kanter Freedom appeared on MSNBC wearing a T-shirt that read, “Taiwan is not China.” (China has banned Celtics broadcasts in the country.)

Meanwhile, the planned U.S. diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics will only escalate China’s growing enmity toward U.S. culture. The question now remains whether Hollywood will continue to kowtow in the face of little financial upside. But Fenton insists that taking the China losses now will open new avenues of growth and expand fan bases. He adds, “Global consumers will prove that capitalism can coexist with doing the right thing.”

This story first appeared in the Dec. 15 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Can't help but wonder how these films would've done with the PRC market, especially Shang-Chi.

[GeneChing]

China Retains Global Box Office Crown With $7.3B in 2021, Down 26 Percent From 2019 (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/china-tops-global-box-office-2021-1235069251/)
Chinese studios bounced back with force in their home market, but revenue for imported Hollywood movies remained down by 70 percent compared to the year before the pandemic.


BY PATRICK BRZESKI
Plus Icon

JANUARY 3, 2022 8:32PM
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/changjinlake2-H-2021.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
COURTESY A REALLY HAPPY FILM

For the second year in a row, China ended 2021 as the world’s largest theatrical film market.

Total movie ticket revenue in the country clocked in at $7.3 billion (RMB 47.3 billion, assuming an average annual exchange rate of RMB 6.45 to $1), more than double last year’s total and down just 26 percent from a pre-pandemic high of $9.2 billion (RMB 64.3 billion) in 2019, according to data from regional box office tracker Artisan Gateway.

Ticket sales at the domestic North American box office, meanwhile, where the industry faced much harsher disruption and fallout from the pandemic throughout the year, revenues are estimated to have remained nearly 60 percent behind 2019 at $4.5 billion.

Worse still for the U.S. industry, Hollywood’s foothold in China’s huge and rapidly recovering marketplace continued to erode over the past year. U.S. movies accounted for just 12 percent of China’s total box office sales, or $899 million (RMB 5.8 billion), down from a 30 percent share in 2019 and total sales of $2.8 billion (RMB 19.4 billion).

During much of the China box office boom era of the late 2000s and 2010s, the Hollywood studios saw their revenue grow in China every year, while they commanded annual market shares as high as 30 percent to 50 percent.

The foremost problem for Hollywood in China in 2021 was simply a dearth of product hitting local screens, analysts say. Just 20 revenue-sharing U.S. titles were released in Chinese cinemas last year, compared to 31 U.S. tentpole releases in 2019 (during China’s peak pandemic year of 2020, there were still 17 studio releases).

Hollywood’s own pandemic-related release postponements were the chief hindrance for the studios in the first half of the year, but by summer their distribution pipelines were pumping again. By then, however, local politics surrounding the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party dictated that Beijing regulators would leave American product on the shelf in favor of patriotically themed Chinese fare. Surging nationalism and political sensitivity among the local public, encouraged by the fraught diplomatic relations between Beijing and Washington, later derailed the release prospects of several bankable Hollywood movies in the final stretch of the year. The casualties included Disney’s Marvel tentpoles Black Widow, Eternals and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings; Warner Bros.’ Space Jam; and Sony’s Venom: Let There Be Carnage and Spider-Man: No Way Home — all fan-favorite properties that collectively could have earned hundreds of millions.

The domestic Chinese industry, meanwhile, continued its remarkable post-COVID recovery (or mid-COVID, depending on how 2022 unfolds…). Some 472 Chinese movies were released in 2021, exceeding the 428 titles the country put out in 2019 before the pandemic. And total sales revenue for Chinese films reached RMB 39.9 billion ($6.19 billion), just shy of 2019’s total of RMB 41.2 billion (about $6 billion according to exchange rates at the time).

Eight of the top 10 biggest films of the year in China were local, led by record-setters The Battle at Lake Changjin ($899 million), Hi, Mom ($822 million) and Detective Chinatown 3 ($686 million). Hollywood’s top earners were Universal’s F9: The Fast Saga ($216.9 million), Legendary and Warner Bros.’ Godzilla vs. Kong ($188.7) and Disney’s Free Guy ($94.8 million).

Many of the biggest Chinese hits of the year, such as the leading title, Korean war epic The Battle of Lake Chongjin, were “main melody” films — propagandistic stories celebrating the glory of China and its leaders — released around the occasion of the CCP’s 100-year anniversary.

“The success of ‘main melody’ films has had a virtuous cycle effect for local films,” says Rance Pow, president of Artisan Gateway. Pow sees three factors driving the commercial resurgence of Chinese cinema over the past year: “The Chinese audience’s growing perception and pride in its nation’s success and position in the global context, homegrown films that cater to local tastes, and a growingly sophisticated film production, marketing, and distribution ecosystem that is backed and overseen by the central government.”

The industry also benefited from increased ticket prices during the year — the average ticket rose to RMB 40.5 ($6.37) in 2021, up 8.7 percent from the 2019 average of RMB 37.1 — despite the fact that total movie theater admissions remained down 29.4 percent from their 2019 peak of 1.7 billion.

New movie theaters also continued to be built at a rapid clip throughout the year. The country added nearly 6,700 new screens, hitting a national total of 82,248, with most of the new construction taking place in rural areas where Chinese-language films play most powerfully.
I know, I know... I need to change the title of this thread. Been meaning to do that since the pandemic began but now I'm thinking I'll keep it so until the pandemic is over, just for nostalgia's sake.

[GeneChing]

China’s New Year Box Office Grosses May Hit New High (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/chinas-new-year-box-office-grosses-may-hit-new-high-1235082399/)
Leading the charge is 'The Battle at Lake Changjin 2: Water Gate Bridge,' the sequel to the country's top-grossing movie of all time with $901.5 million

BY PATRICK BRZESKI

JANUARY 29, 2022 3:31PM
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/changjinlake2-H-2021.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
'The Battle at Lake Changjin' COURTESY A REALLY HAPPY FILM
As moviegoing in North America and Europe is getting battered all over again thanks to the omicron variant, China’s theatrical film sector is revving up to set a slew of new box-office records.

The country’s weeklong Chinese New Year holiday period, always a bonanza for local studios and exhibitors, kicks off Feb. 1, and analysts believe a bumper crop of high-profile potential blockbusters — eight local titles are currently scheduled for simultaneous release this year — could lift the market to unprecedented heights.

During Chinese New Year in 2021, ticket sales totaled a record $1.2 billion, with family comedy Hi, Mom leading the way with an eventual total haul of $821 million (Wanda’s comedy Detective Chinatown 3 wasn’t far behind with $685 million). Ticket revenue during the seven-day holiday amounted to a whopping 16.6 percent of China’s full-year box office total and the full month of February took at 25 percent share of the year’s sales (Unfortunately for Hollywood, Beijing blocks all foreign film releases during the family holiday — a practice U.S. trade negotiators have lamented with little effect for over a decade — so all gains go only to the local Chinese industry).

Analysts are expecting more of the same for 2022. “This year’s Chinese New Year season could reach a new high-water mark of $1.3 billion to $1.4 billion (RMB 8 billion to RMB 8.5 billion),” says Rance Pow, president of cinema industry consultancy Artisan Gateway.

Leading the charge is The Battle at Lake Changjin 2: Water Gate Bridge, the second installment in a nationalistic war saga about China’s real-life victory over the U.S. in a key battle during the Korean War. Co-directed by a trio of Chinese hitmakers, Chen Kaige, Tsui Hark and Dante Lam, the franchise’s first film was only released last September and went on to become China’s top-grossing movie of all time with $901.5 million. China’s state-backed Global Times newspaper reported Jan. 23 that the film was leading the ticket pre-sales race with $5.64 million with a little over a week to go before opening day. The outlet went so far as to forecast that The Battle at Lake Changjin 2 would become the first Chinese film to earn over $1 billion (RMB 6.5 billion)

China’s box office outcomes are notoriously tricky to predict with confidence, however, as frontrunners have often been felled by negative audience reaction within the early hours of their release, and dark horse contenders have then galloped ahead. “Social media word of mouth in China can be a powerful determinant of a film’s commercial success, and the market has shown an adeptness for adjusting to audience preference if the pre-season favorite does not launch quickly,” explains Pow.

Other top contenders this year include drama Nice View, director Wen Muye’s follow-up to his 2018 hit, Dying to Survive ($451 million); and road trip comedy-drama Only Fools Rush In, from former blogger turned fan favorite director Han Han (his previously release, Pegasus, earned $256 million in 2019); local director legend Zhang Yimou’s Korean War biopic, Sharpshooter; and comedy caper Too Cool to Kill, from relative newcomer, Xing Wenxiong; among much else.

The only major Western entertainment business that enjoys regular participation in the Chinese New Year earnings sensation is Imax, which operates over 750 screens in the country. Each year, the Canadian exhibitor places its bets by picking one or two titles to covert into its giant screen format. In 2020, Imax has selected three expected winners, Battle at Lake Changjin 2 (which was filmed for Imax), Nice View and Han Han’s Only Fools Rush In.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/4rep_lunarholiday-chart_EMBED.jpg
SOURCE: ARTISAN GATEWAY

For the record, I circled back and reviewed part 1 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72154-The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin&p=1322530#post1322530).

threads
The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin-2-Water-Gate-Bridge (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72238-The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin-2-Water-Gate-Bridge)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
Year-of-the-Tiger (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72166-2022-Year-of-the-Tiger)

[GeneChing]

Feb 7, 2022 3:28pm PT
‘China Has Ghosted Hollywood’: How the Fallout Will Affect the Film Industry (https://variety.com/2022/film/news/china-hollywood-film-industry-tensions-red-carpet-book-1235173819/)
Wall Street Journal reporter Erich Schwartzel's new book "Red Carpet" offers a timely look at increased tensions between two dominant forces in the movie business

By Rebecca Rubin

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/red-carpet-book.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
Amazon
At some point in the past decade, Hollywood stopped looking at the burgeoning Chinese box office as found money and instead embraced the theatrical market’s windfall for what it has become: a necessity.

Today, whether or not blockbuster plays in China could mean the difference between hundreds of millions of dollars in ticket sales. That reality is downright painful at a time when China has continued to deny releases for Hollywood’s biggest 2021 movies, such as Disney’s “Black Widow,” “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” and “Eternals,” as well as Sony’s “Venom: Let There Be Carnage.” And the few films that were given access to Chinese movie theaters, including MGM’s James Bond sequel “No Time to Die” and Denis Villeneuve’s “Dune” remake, earned far less than their studios had expected.

China has always been strict about the number of foreign films it allows to screen across the country’s thousands of venues. But recently, there has been increased ambiguity about why the world’s largest theatrical market has all but closed the door on U.S. project — and if it will change in 2022 and beyond.

“China has ghosted Hollywood,” says Wall Street Journal reporter Erich Schwartzel. His new book, “Red Carpet: Hollywood, China, and the Global Battle for Cultural Supremacy,” hits shelves on Tuesday and offers a timely look at long-standing tensions between the two dominant forces in the movie business. “About a year ago, I would have said we’re looking at a future where China needs Hollywood less and less, and Hollywood should start taking steps to prepare. But over the past year, it’s been drastic.”

Ahead of the release of “Red Carpet,” Schwartzel spoke to Variety about China’s growing influence on Hollywood — and what it means for the film industry.

China hasn’t granted access to many major Hollywood movies, but it recently approved Woody Allen’s romantic comedy “A Rainy Day in New York,” which is three years old. What’s the reasoning behind these decisions?

The Woody Allen thing almost feels like trolling at this point. There’s a lot of theories. One is there’s a broader trend toward Chinese moviegoers preferring Chinese entertainment. You’ve seen American movies making up a smaller and smaller share of the box office over the past couple of years. This feels more charged than that. It feels like an effort to punish America as tensions rise. A lot of the people making decisions on what movies get in, they’re also interested in keeping their jobs. Sometimes the risk assessment is pretty easy. If you know that tensions between the U.S. and China are relatively high, do you really want to be the state bureaucrat who lobbies to let an American movie in and risk sticking your neck out?

There also seems to be an effort within China to stir nationalism and keep outside influence out. One thing that surprised me when I was writing this book is just how often China will turn on or turn off that spigot. There have been numerous examples throughout history when China, for whatever reason, maybe it’s a Communist Party anniversary, will say, “We’re going to cut back on the number of foreign films we let in.” And not only that, but “we also want state TV stations to start showing Chinese war movies, something that will bolster bolster patriotism.” What we’ve seen in the past year with all these major movies not getting in is the most consequential pattern that we’ve ever seen. There are a lot of studios with a big fat zero in a column they were expecting some money.

Are Marvel movies or “Fast and Furious” installments, which have always been enormously successful in China, waning in popularity? Or does the Chinese government have outsized influence on which movies do well?

It’s such a chicken-egg question. The controls that were put in place several years ago, like blackout dates or stacking movies so they cannibalize one another’s grosses, are still used, but less necessary — in part because Chinese movies, often with the help of Hollywood, have gotten better. People [in the U.S.] lament you can’t make any movie that’s not a superhero tentpole anymore. In China, there’s actually a pretty robust moviemaking operation of comedies, dramas and science fiction and original stories. And they’ve been doing really well. China is always going to want controls that ensure it looks to be the preferred option. But I also think that it is becoming more and more the preferred option. I don’t know if studios should have been as surprised as they were that eventually Chinese people would prefer to see Chinese stories and Chinese movie stars.
continued next post

[GeneChing]

“Spider-Man: No Way Home” has managed to become a huge success without China. Can mega-budgeted movies still survive if they don’t get an attractive release date in China, or is that film an exception?

I think it’s an example of how they can do well, but it’s also an example of how they could have done better. Any studio executive would still prefer $1.9 billion [in global box office grosses] to $1.6 billion. The key question: As China becomes more and more of an uncertainty, does that change the budgets these movies are greenlit at? You can run a good business making $1.5 billion on a movie, but it may be a different equation than one that was expecting [to earn] $1.8 billion. “Spider-Man” is doing such gargantuan business, but I think it’s probably a little dicier for movies on the bubble. There have been a lot of expensive movies that China has meant the difference between profit and loss.

Hollywood is laser-focused on streaming. How does that change the film industry’s reliance on China?

It’s bifurcated things a bit. If streaming is going to mean that theatrical releases are reserved for the biggest of the big movies, that makes China more powerful in that department. But if there’s this other part of the business that’s really streaming oriented, that does reduce reliance because a lot of streaming content from studios doesn’t get into China. The business model is different whenever you’re trying to count subscriptions and not box office tickets. In one bucket, it has allowed China to retain power, but in another, China is a little irrelevant. Will a Disney Plus try to get into China? This traditionally has not worked out, but we keep learning time and time again that 1.4 billion consumers are impossible to ignore.

U.S. ticket sales are split roughly 50-50 between studios and theater operators. With China, studios only get 25% of revenues, but in return they don’t pay for marketing or distribution. Since it’s a notably smaller percentage, are those receipts mostly inflating the global box office figure or are they actually beneficial to film studios?

It’s mostly the latter. It’s not pure profit, but it’s much closer [to that] than what they get in the U.S. For a long time, studios were lobbying to the U.S. government and the MPA [Motion Picture Association] to do something about that. The 25% term was set in 2012, when China was a fraction of the market it is today. A lot of folks in Hollywood think China is allowed to operate on developing market rules, despite being a massively developed market. The 25%, while still a frustration, due to the intricacies of the dynamic — no marketing costs, things like that — it’s still found money. There’s comparatively much less work to do when you’re releasing a movie in China than another market.

What do you make of censorship in other territories, like North Korea?

We haven’t seen anything as dramatic as the North Korea hack. But the Chloe Zhao case last year was pretty high profile and extreme. A lot of folks will say, “Well, it’s the market reality. We censor movies for Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, airplanes.” The key difference is none have put the studios at odds with its own government. The U.S.-China rivalry is being called the story of the 21st century. It’s hard to ignore the fact that whenever decisions are being made, they are playing a role in this broader ideological debate.

Since Netflix isn’t available in China, it is one of the few Hollywood companies without a vested interest in appeasing Chinese censors. Is that important?

It’s a fascinating exception to the rule. It doesn’t seem like they’ll get into China, and it has given them this kind of freedom. As they censor elsewhere, they seem to not have to worry about China to the degree other studios have. It seems, so far, that just meant they’ll carry shows and documentaries that others wouldn’t touch. It doesn’t feel like it’s translated into a purposeful mission. I haven’t heard of Netflix saying, “We’re not in China, so let’s greenlight a bunch of content critical of China.” But it does seem to give them a license that other studios and tech companies moving into China don’t have.

China recently restored the original “Fight Club” ending after censorship backlash. Were you surprised to see that reversal?

We don’t necessarily see any kind of reaction to these things in China. It introduced a lot of Americans to what storytelling in China is like, with every movie trying to reach a moral equilibrium. It was like that in the U.S. for a while when Hollywood was much more religiously influenced. There had to be consequences for bad actions. But China takes that to another level. Most Chinese moviegoers see through this. I don’t think there are a lot of Chinese moviegoers streaming “Fight Club” and not seeing what [the revised ending] is all about. I would talk to people who would say things like, “I thought it was pretty good for a propaganda movie.” There’s more awareness that Americans can acknowledge. It’s not like people are seeing a movie and then being like, “Oh, thank God the Chinese government stopped Tyler Durden.

This interview has been edited and condense for clarity. This looks like a good read.

[GeneChing]

How China Captured Hollywood (https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2022/02/china-captured-hollywood/621618/)

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A giant statue from 'Kong: Skull Island' movie displayed in Guangzhou, China in 2017. (Anadolu Agency / Getty)
FEBRUARY 8, 2022

In the weeks following the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, a group of Chinese executives traveled to Los Angeles for a crash course in influence. Inside the UCLA classroom of the film professor Robert Rosen, a parade of Hollywood executives conducted a series of lectures on America’s entertainment industry. The students had been chosen by their country’s State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television, and they were in Los Angeles with a mandate: to learn how the American film industry had achieved its status as the leader in global culture—and how China could re-create that achievement back home.

The head of Universal Pictures, the studio behind Frankenstein, Back to the Future, and The Fast and the Furious, spoke about his film operation, a conglomerate grown out of a collection of nickelodeons founded in 1912. So did the CEO of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, a company that was established before the talkie and eventually produced The Wizard of Oz, West Side Story, and The Silence of the Lambs. An agent at William Morris, the talent agency that counts Matt Damon and Denzel Washington as clients, talked about how he managed America’s biggest movie stars. An independent producer explained the art of putting a movie’s finances together, and the head of the Motion Picture Association of America detailed his organization’s lobbying work in Washington on behalf of the nation’s entertainers. It was hard to imagine a more glamorous set of day jobs, positions that turned the men and women who held them into stewards and emissaries of American culture.

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This piece is excerpted from Schwartzel’s recent book.
That China would send officials to Los Angeles to learn from America’s most famous capitalist enterprise would have been unthinkable in prior decades, when the Cultural Revolution and the massacre of protesters at Tiananmen Square left little doubt about the government’s attitude toward free expression. Yet China in 2008 was ascendant, even if that rise occurred out of view of many Americans—including many in Hollywood, where the country’s work was just beginning. At the time, the Chinese visitors’ unassuming exterior masked incredible power. One young executive worked at a movie channel that had 800 million viewers, a scale beyond what any of his Hollywood instructors could fathom.

In a matter of years, the positioning of the two parties in that classroom—the Chinese as students and the Hollywood executives as teachers—would seem both prescient and absurd, the dynamic soon to reverse, with Hollywood looking to China for help.

Consider the future of the entities represented in that classroom alone. Within a decade of those classes, Universal would complete a $500 million financing deal with a Chinese firm, cast Chinese actresses in its biggest movies, and construct a Universal theme park near Beijing. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer would shop itself for a Chinese takeover and censor James Bond movies to make sure Chinese citizens never looked weak when matched against England’s ageless secret agent. William Morris would open an office in China to help the country’s new class of A-listers win over global audiences. Producers would rewrite scripts, trading New York for Shanghai if it meant getting a movie financed by Chinese billionaires. The MPAA and other officials in Washington would do anything they could to maintain access to the fast-growing Chinese box office as domestic moviegoing flatlined.

Chinese theaters were largely closed off to the world until 1994, when Hollywood studios were allowed to export 10 movies a year to the country. At the time, $3 million represented a record-setting gross in China. Even when those Chinese students arrived at UCLA, the market was growing but still a bundle of optimistic projections. By 2020, though, China had become the No. 1 box-office market in the world, home to grosses that routinely neared $1 billion—a market that became too big to ignore and too lucrative to anger. Through it all, China would continue to see Hollywood much as those early visitors did: as the ultimate template for building a show business that helped fuel a country’s rise, their goal a 21st-century sequel to what America’s entertainers had done for their country over the course of 100 years.

Ijoined the los angeles bureau of The Wall Street Journal in the summer of 2013, hired to be a fresh set of eyes on the Journal’s Hollywood coverage, and I soon started seeing China everywhere I looked.

One announcement followed another: The Chinese star Fan Bingbing had been cast in the new X-Men. An American theater chain headquartered in Leawood, Kansas, was trading on Wall Street thanks to financing from China’s richest man. Paramount Pictures was rushing to edit World War Z to remove a scene implying that a zombie outbreak had originated in China. Seemingly every producer in town was shopping a script based on the Flying Tigers, the World War II pilots who helped defend China against Japan. Moviegoers in the eastern Chinese city of Qingdao were flocking to see the latest Transformers, sending millions of dollars in unexpected grosses back to its studio on Melrose Avenue.

To many observers, this was another round of “dumb money” flowing into Hollywood, long an industry capable of wooing investors with stardust. When I learned that a government agenda out of Beijing was actually backing the efforts—an agenda clear for anyone to see—I realized that this would not be a case of fleeting interest.

China’s economic leverage had quickly translated into political sway, most often in the censorship practiced by Beijing bureaucrats. Unbeknownst to most moviegoers, studios were removing scenes and dialogue from scripts and finished movies to appease Chinese censors—scrubbing any production of plot points that brushed up against sensitive Chinese history or made the country look anything less than a modern, sophisticated world power. Even more disturbing than the movies being changed were the ones not getting made at all, for fear of angering Chinese officials. Hollywood became a commercial arm for China’s new ambition, and piece by piece, China’s interest in the American film industry revealed itself to be a complement to its political ascendance, one that is rewriting the global order of the new century.

continued next post

[GeneChing]

The story of this unexpected relationship can be told in three acts. It begins with the founding of Hollywood itself, an industry of workaday seamstresses and actors that transformed into a powerhouse that pulled the world toward the United States. Hollywood became America’s No. 1 export, shipping the swagger of John Wayne, the resistance heroes of Star Wars, and the romantic sweep of Titanic around the world. For politicians, the movies became a vehicle of influence—especially so in China, which began to permit Hollywood films into its theaters in the 1990s as part of a broader modernizing effort. Economics bested Communist Party instincts to hide dangerous thoughts from its people, generating box-office grosses that would prove indispensable to American studio executives.

The second act is the collision that followed, a decade during which Hollywood vulnerabilities met Chinese ambition. Out of nowhere appeared a market with 1.4 billion potential customers—a population of spenders that one Hollywood executive described to me as “a great national resource.” Accessing that resource would require bowing to censorship demands and navigating political land mines to build a theme park or secure Chinese financing. Throughout this period, Chinese producers and politicians maintained the student-teacher relationship evident in that UCLA classroom, turning to Hollywood experts for help building a commercial film industry of their own, one that transformed the theatrical propaganda of previous generations into popcorn entertainment.

The third act focuses the spotlight on China, where President Xi Jinping presides over a movie industry that has become an essential arm of a recast Middle Kingdom, a business modeled after America’s but molded to account for the Communist Party’s expectation that art will serve the state. The filmography of China in recent years has given its audiences what Americans have taken for granted: stories about people who look like them, who work and play in a country claiming a moment in history. Now China is trying to complete the hardest piece of the puzzle: shipping those movies overseas—and with them the values and vision that they embody and the alternative mode of governance to Western liberal democracy that they promote. As China redraws the geopolitical alignments of the world, it wants to use its movies to redraw the cultural borders atop them.

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Paramount Pictures / Sunset Boulevard / Corbis / Getty
The arc of china’s influence is evident in a single Hollywood franchise, Top Gun, in which the geopolitical tensions of the next century came to be reflected in a two-inch patch sewn onto a movie star’s costume.

The original 1986 film is a hallmark of Ronald Reagan’s America—Tom Cruise as the aviator-wearing daredevil Maverick, Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away,” the hero declaring, “I feel the need …” In a sign of how deeply the film saw itself as a celebration of the U.S. Navy, producers asked the military to cooperate on the picture and acceded to its wishes to make the movie a robust demonstration of American military might. They scrapped a scene involving a crash and turned Maverick’s love interest, originally a fellow Navy member, into a contractor so audiences didn’t see the hero breaking rules about relationships among personnel. Moviegoers didn’t mind the jingoism; they wanted to watch their country’s naval aviators pull off awesome stunts and save the day. Top Gun grossed $177 million in North America, more than any other movie released that year. It also did what years of state-produced recruitment videos could not, boosting young men and women’s interest in joining the armed forces. Recruiters waited in theater lobbies to catch moviegoers on their way out of the film. (Ray-Ban sales shot up too.)

In 2017, Paramount Pictures announced that it would reboot Top Gun with its original star, another example of Hollywood’s effective strategy of bathing audiences in nostalgia. But much about the global film market had changed in the intervening years. Top Gun: Maverick, as the sequel would be called, was so expensive that studio chiefs approved its production with accounting projections that assumed its global gross would include Chinese ticket sales. What’s more, some of that $150 million budget came courtesy of Skydance Media, a Los Angeles film and TV company partially financed by Tencent, the Chinese tech firm behind China’s most popular messaging app. Chinese money was backing the new Top Gun in two ways: in financing behind the scenes and in expected box-office grosses once it hit theaters there.

This all explains what happened to Tom Cruise’s jacket. In the original film, Maverick’s bomber featured a patch that highlighted the U.S.S. Galveston’s tour of Japan, Taiwan, and other countries in the Pacific, with flags from those countries below his collar. Chinese investors on the new movie pointed out to Skydance executives that those 1986 patches now posed a problem: China has long argued that Taiwan—a self-ruling island off the coast of the mainland—is a renegade province, and has insisted that it will be reintegrated into China. Having a global movie star flaunt Taiwan’s flag on his back undermined Chinese sovereignty. And given China’s decades-long animosity toward Japan, the studio executives reasoned that they should play it safe and erase that patch too.

When Paramount unveiled the poster for Top Gun: Maverick in the summer of 2019, it showed Cruise from the back, his signature brown leather jacket in focus and the flags of Taiwan and Japan—U.S. allies in real life—removed. Chinese officials did not even have to weigh in. By 2019, Hollywood had so fully absorbed Beijing’s political preferences that such decisions were made by teams in Los Angeles months, or even years, before Chinese officials would weigh in. If it could help Paramount executives make their case to Chinese censors that Top Gun should show in Chinese theaters, Maverick’s bomber would adhere to the One China policy.

What happened between the two Top Guns is a story with implications that stretch far beyond the entertainment industry. Hollywood’s experience has served as a precursor for numerous American industries and companies trying to do business in China, including Apple and the National Basketball Association. In the months following the coronavirus outbreak, China’s economic recovery proved a financial salvation for struggling companies across numerous sectors, further boosting the country’s leverage.

China’s omnipresence onscreen reflects the country’s increasing ubiquity in business and in other parts of the world. That ubiquity has also exported a worldwide fear of crossing China. These concerns only grew as tensions between the U.S. and China escalated during Donald Trump’s administration and Xi’s aggressive crackdown on dissent. As China loomed large in the collective imagination, the lives and experiences of individual Chinese citizens were lost in many sweeping geopolitical analyses. Those deeply involved in Hollywood’s economic relationship with China grew quiet too, worried not only about losing their business but also about graver consequences: being called in for questioning, getting thrown out of the country, disappearing.

In early 2020, I had lunch at a vegan restaurant blocks from Warner Bros. with an executive who worked in China. Before we could begin talking, she turned off her cellphone and put it in her purse underneath the table. When that didn’t assuage her fears, she took her purse to the other side of the restaurant and asked the staff to keep it behind the counter. She then wondered if she should go put it in her car, because she’d heard that the Chinese government could surveil a conversation even from across the room. Chinese paranoia had infiltrated Burbank.

By pressuring Hollywood and its own entertainment industry, China could displace the American film industry as the chief narrator of the 21st century. Hollywood, by maintaining warm relations with the regime, has bolstered China’s campaign for global influence with American movies that either turn every portrayal of the country into a state-sanctioned commercial or avoid anything that challenges how Xi’s party sees the world.

In some cases, the rise of China’s entertainment industry has deepened our understanding of a country and culture that remain misunderstood, even demonized. In more insidious cases, it has braided a censorious agenda into moviemaking, corrupting America’s most effective tool for selling democracy and free expression to the world. Over this next century, China wants to use the movies to rebrand itself, and it has learned how to do so from the best. All of this has happened before our very eyes.

More on Red Carpet here (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising&p=1322557#post1322557).

[GeneChing]

Mar 13, 2022 8:28pm PT
China Box Office Slips to Lowest Weekend of the Year as COVID Resurfaces (https://variety.com/2022/film/asia/china-box-office-lowest-weekend-of-the-year-1235203899/)

By Patrick Frater
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©Raymond Depardon / Magnum Photo
Mainland China’s theatrical box office slipped to its lowest weekend total of the year as the market suffered a combination of rising COVID cases and a lack of new releases.

Nationwide box office between Friday and Sunday amounted to just $19.2 million, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. It was the fifth weekend of decline since the splashy opening of eight major titles on Feb. 1 for the Lunar New Year holidays.

“The Battle at Lake Changjin II,” which dominated proceedings at New Year, remained at the top of the chart for the sixth consecutive weekend. It earned a lowly $4.6 million over three days for a cumulative total of $635 million.

Recent days have witnessed a surge in coronavirus cases in China that has caused the return of restrictions in major cities including Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen as well as epicenters Jilin and Changchun in the Northeast.

On Sunday, mainland authorities reported a total of 3,100 new locally transmitted cases of the disease in people who have symptoms and those who do not (China’s official count does not include asymptomatic cases as confirmed) and started to allow the results of rapid antigen tests in its data set. These are the highest daily figures in China in two years.

China is operating a zero-COVID policy which entails largely closed borders, mass vaccination and localized lockdowns. Mainland China has reported 112,000 infections since the beginning of the outbreak in January 2020 and 4,635 deaths. Some 1.24 billion people have received at least one vaccination shot.

It has been reported locally that some cinemas in Shanghai and Shenzhen were closed in response to the latest spikes. But a nationwide closure of movie theaters, like the five and a half month disruption in 2020, has so far been avoided.

Another factor in the slumping box office is likely to be a continuing shortage of major new films. The weekend’s highest new entry was the fourth-placed “Do You Love Me As I Love You?”. The film is a Taiwan-produced romance that released in other Chinese-speaking parts of Asia in the third quarter of 2020.

Monday sees the release in China of “Uncharted,” timed to give it a shot at the one day Qingming festival. And, if COVID conditions do not cause widespread cinema closures, Friday will see the release of “The Batman.”


threads
The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin-2-Water-Gate-Bridge (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72238-The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin-2-Water-Gate-Bridge)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
The-Batman (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?70147-The-Batman)
covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

Maybe The Batman won't dethrone TB@LC2 (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72238-The-Battle-at-Lake-Changjin-2-Water-Gate-Bridge)...


‘The Batman’ Headed for Weak China Opening Amid COVID Outbreak, Cinema Closures (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/china-box-office-the-batman-covid-1235112446/)
Amid fraught geopolitics and virus-related release challenges, Hollywood studio films are earning a fraction of past China grosses.

BY PATRICK BRZESKI, KAREN CHU
MARCH 15, 2022 8:27PM
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The Batman COURTESY OF WARNER BROS. PICTURES™ & DC COMICS
Hollywood can’t seem to catch a break in China lately. Just as U.S. studio tentpoles were beginning to return to the country at scale, a COVID outbreak spanning two thirds of China’s provinces is shuttering cinemas and casting a pall over local consumer activity all over again.

Approximately 30 percent of all Chinese movie theaters have been temporarily closed over the past week, according to exhibition industry consultancy Artisan Gateway. The regions hardest hit include major population centers like Shanghai and Shenzhen.

Locally transmitted COVID cases rose on Tuesday by more than 5,000 new infections nationwide. While low by Western standards, the current outbreak represents China’s largest caseload since the pandemic first emerged in Wuhan in 2020. Local officials are scrambling to maintain their “COVID zero” policy of total eradication of the virus, resorting to their usual playbook of mass mandatory testing and the total shutdown of cities comprising tens of millions of residents.

If Beijing leaders fail to get a handle on the infection surge soon, economists warn that China’s growing response could result in major supply chain snarls in the world’s manufacturing base, further jeopardizing the global economic recovery.

Within the movie sector, box office analysts had been looking forward to the China release of Warner Bros’ The Batman on Friday for some indication of the country’s current appetite for U.S. superhero fare. A source close to the film, however, tells The Hollywood Reporter that the latest tracking suggests an opening of just $15 million to $20 million, down from earlier projections in the $25 million to $30 million range.

“Our optimistic assessment is that Warners will be lucky if The Batman opens above RMB 100 million ($15.7 million),” adds James Li, co-founder of Beijing-based film industry market research firm Fanink, which has been tracking the title. “On the pessimistic side, they may be lucky to get half that,” he says. “There are four tier-one cities in China (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen), and these are the major markets where moviegoers tend to be the most pro-Hollywood — and half of them are currently shut down.”

Domestically, The Batman has earned $245 million, with the worldwide total sitting at about $472 million.

Director Matt Reeves’ take on Gotham’s dark knight is somber in tone and runs nearly three hours long, hence the rather modest original sales expectations. But the film will be the first U.S. superhero movie to open in China in nearly a year and half, after local regulators passed on the release of the last five Marvel tentpoles (Black Widow, Eternals, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Venom: Let There Be Carnage and Spider-Man: No Way Home) due to suspected political reasons. Hopes were high that The Batman might give the studios some hint of their former glory in the massive China market.

Sony and Tom Holland’s Uncharted is similarly struggling in China amid the theater closures and diminished interest in U.S. moviemaking. The action adventure film has earned $114 million in North America and $302 million worldwide so far. But it has brought in just $4.5 million in China since its opening on Monday and local ticketing app Maoyan projects it to finish locally with just $13.2 million.

Chinese consumers’ declining enthusiasm for U.S. moviemaking is becoming increasingly unmistakable. After a decade of pulling in enormous blockbuster grosses from China, the only Hollywood films to earn over $100 million in the country in the past two years plus were Legendary Entertainment’s Godzilla Versus Kong and Universal’s F9: The Fast Saga. Meanwhile, more than 20 Chinese titles have sailed past the $100 million mark during that same period, and the very biggest local blockbusters have earned more than $500 million a piece.

Other upcoming Hollywood titles headed to China in the weeks ahead include Roland Emmerich’s disaster action film Moonfall (March 25), Sony’s animation sequel Hotel Transylvania: Transformania (April 3) and Warner Bros’ Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (April 8).

“Over the past two years, the Hollywood brand has definitely taken a hit in China — for a variety of reasons related to supply, the actions of authorities and local market dynamics,” says Li. “It’s going to take some time and strong marketing effort to re-engage Chinese consumers around the Hollywood brand.”

There is some concern in the mainland Chinese industry that the plight of neighboring Hong Kong could foreshadow what’s to come if health officials aren’t able to tamp down the current COVID outbreak soon.

The omicron variant arrived in Hong Kong near the start of the year and local cinemas were closed on January 7 as infection caseloads skyrocketed. The suspension came on the heels of a strong box-office recovery in the semi-autonomous city, with Spider-Man: No Way Home taking more than $14 million in just two weeks in December 2021. A month after cinemas were ordered to suspend business, two major multiplexes – Broadway Hollywood and Cinema City Victoria – announced their permanent closure as their leases ended. Although the box office returns in Hong Kong in 2021 showed 125 percent growth compared to 2020, from $69 million to $155 million in total sales, the latest outbreak has decimated the local exhibition business. The theater industry missed out on the lucrative Lunar New Year holiday season in February, and the Hong Kong releases of West Side Story, Death on the Nile and The Batman, originally scheduled for January, February and March 2022, respectively, were all scrapped. The local government has indicated that reopening theaters won’t be considered until at least April 20.

Pamela McClintock contributed to this report.

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covid (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

China Box Office: ‘Fantastic Beasts 3’ Opens to $10M Amid Mass Cinema Shutdowns (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/fantastic-beasts-3-china-box-office-1235128060/)
Approximately 54 percent of Chinese movie theaters are currently closed as the country battles local COVID outbreaks.

BY PATRICK BRZESKI

APRIL 10, 2022 10:41PM
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COURTESY OF WARNER BROS. PICTURES

Warner Bros.’ Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore cruised to an easy win during its opening weekend in China, but the prize was smaller than usual.

The Harry Potter spinoff sequel earned just $9.7 million, according to data from Artisan Gateway. Thanks to ongoing COVID-19 outbreaks, an estimated 54 percent of China’s cinemas are currently closed.

The first Fantastic Beasts film opened to $40.4 million in China in 2016, and the sequel, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, debuted to $36.6 million in 2018.

Social scores for the Secrets of Dumbledore were solid, if unexceptional: 8.7 on Maoyan, 8.7 from Alibaba’s Taopiaopiao and 6.7 on Douban.

The film performed somewhat better on Imax, earning $1.5 million in the giant-screen format, or 15 percent of its nationwide total. Dumbledore played on 360 Imax screens, roughly half of Imax’s usual outlay.

In recent months and years, Hollywood titles have been earning conspicuously less than they once did in China, but the current COVID closures make it difficult to assess whether the general trend of waning local enthusiasm for U.S. movies was also a factor in Dumbledore’s lackluster opening.

Sony’s animated sequel Hotel Transylvania 4 earned just $1.4 million in its second weekend for a running total of $6.2 million. Hotel Transylvania 3 (2018) earned $32.2 million in China.

Other U.S.-made titles added similarly tiny sums. Escape Room 2, in cinemas for its second weekend, added $940,000, taking its total to $5.2 million. Roland Emmerich’s Moonfall, which was co-financed by Chinese studio Huayi Brothers Media, added $900,000. The film has earned $19.4 million since its local release late last month — slightly better than its $19.1 million North American total.

threads
Fantastic-Beasts (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?69820-Fantastic-Beasts)
Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

May 17, 2022 8:00pm PT
India Takes Over the Cannes Market as Chinese Executives Are Stuck at Home (https://variety.com/2022/film/news/india-china-cannes-market-1235267814/)
By Naman Ramachandran, Patrick Frater
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Deepika-Padukone-Cannes-Red-Carpet.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
L'Oreal

India is the country of honor at the Cannes Film Market and consequently a massive contingent from the country is descending upon the Croisette. Variety understands that some 400 attendees are winging their way from India, and that French embassies across the country were working at capacity to issue visas.

That stands in contrast with the attendance from other parts of Asia, further East. Attendance of participants from Hong Kong and China is massively down compared with pre-COVID times. Korean companies are back in respectable numbers, with some attending a physical market outside their home country for the first time in over two years. The solid attendance of Korean executives also reflects the selection of Korean films across multiple sections of the festival.

“I’m very excited to be back in Cannes, it has been three years for us,” said Danny Lee, senior manager at Contents Panda, part of the Next Entertainment World studio. “There are many Korean buyers here too.”

The government-mandated travel restrictions that persist in Hong Kong (compulsory quarantine is down to a week now, having previously been 21 days, but the government maintains an aggressive approach towards airlines that carry passengers later found to be COVID positive) mean that flight conditions and the ability to return home are simply too uncertain for many.

That in turn deprives the Cannes Market of executives from what was previously the hub of Asian sales and film finance — even if that role has been somewhat eroded by the increasing maturity of the mainland Chinese film industry and the prominence of the Korean industry.

Hong Kong companies including Golden Network and Good Move Media are not attending, and will instead attempt to launch films and maintain business relations remotely. Others, including Edko Films and Media Asia, are making the effort and will be present.

“We have a big-budget film ‘Kowloon Walled City’ to sell. Given how difficult it is currently to pre-sell Asian films, we need to talk to people in person,” said Fred Tsui, GM, head of sales and international co-production at Media Asia.

China has limited in- and out-bound travel for months, as it seeks to achieve a COVID-zero policy through lockdowns, mass testing and border controls. This week it imposed its most stringent travel restrictions for decades, banning all but essential overseas travel.

That leaves Cannes without the mainland Chinese companies which, in pre-COVID years, had regularly grabbed headlines. They were not necessarily volume buyers, but were previously involved in large package deals and big-budget co-productions. Other Chinese firms were looking to invest in international IP that could be exploited across multiple media.

The COVID era, however, has coincided with a more generalized slowdown of the Chinese film market and a politically directed retrenchment towards local content. That makes it difficult to quantify China’s loss to Cannes.

But, it is perhaps more than symbolic that Wednesday’s Cannes Market opening party, is this year sponsored by India. China had been its sponsor for several years.

Anurag Thakur, India’s Minister of Information and Broadcasting, will inaugurate the Indian Pavilion in the presence of actor R. Madhavan, whose directorial debut “Rocketry” is premiering at the market; filmmaker Shekhar Kapur; Prasoon Joshi and Vani Tripathi from the Central Board of Film Certification; Grammy-winner Ricky Kej; and a plethora of actors including Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Pooja Hegde, Tamannaah Bhatia and Aditi Rao Hydari.

Bollywood A-lister Akshay Kumar was due to be at the pavilion inauguration, but contracted COVID.

India will be prominently visible throughout the festival this year. Actor Deepika Padukone is on the jury for the main feature film competition. Oscar-winner A.R. Rahman’s directorial debut, “Le Musk,” is premiering at the market’s Cannes XR program. Indian filmmaker Shaunak Sen’s Sundance grand jury prize winning documentary “All That Breathes” is showing as a special screening. And Indian auteur Satyajit Ray’s “The Adversary” (1970) and Aravindan Govindan’s “The Circus Tent” will be screened at the festival’s Cannes Classics strand.

TV star Helly Shah will walk the red carpet for L’Oreal and also promote her film debut “Kaya Palat.” Multihyphenate Kamal Haasan will be present to promote his new film “Vikram.” There will be plenty of first looks unveiled, including for Shyam Benegal’s “Mujib: The Making of a Nation,” the biopic of late Bangladeshi leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, for which top Bangladeshi star Nusrat Imrose Tisha is expected alongside her filmmaker partner Mostofa Sarwar Farooki. Bangladeshi director/producer Abu Shahed Emon is also due at Cannes. First looks are also being unveiled for Pushan Kripalani’s “Goldfish” and Sandeep Singh’s “Safed.”

“When you are a country of honor at the world’s largest film market you are on the radar of the Western world — it could be because of your creativity and international appeal, or maybe because of business potential and mass audience reach. We seem to be better-known for the latter,” said Samir Sarkar, who is co-producing Cannes’ La Fabrique project selection “Starfruits” via his Indo-Singaporean outfit Magic Hour Films.

“As far as our creativity and international appeal goes, it’s time we nurture and support those filmmakers that can take Indian cinema into something more meaningful and successful for world audiences,” Sarkar added.

From Pakistan, Saim Sadiq’s feature debut “Joyland,” produced, among others, by Indian-origin Apoorva Guru Charan, is premiering at the festival’s Un Certain Regard strand.

Cannes (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?53853-Cannes)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)
covid (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?71666-Coronavirus-(COVID-19)-Wuhan-Pneumonia)

[GeneChing]

China Box Office Shrinks 38 Percent in First Half of 2022, North America Regains Top Spot (https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/china-box-office-loses-top-spot-1235175449/)
North America is on track to reclaim the crown as the world's biggest theatrical movie market this year as COVID lockdowns and fewer Hollywood releases continue to weigh on ticket sales in China.


BY PATRICK BRZESKI

JULY 5, 2022 5:00AM


https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/battle-top-gun.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
After two, brief years of dominance, China is surrendering the global box office crown back to North America in 2022.

During the darkest days of the pandemic for Hollywood, when most major tentpoles were put on hold or shifted to streaming, China swept past the U.S. in total ticket sales for the first time in movie history in 2020. The country repeated the feat last year, notching $7.3 billion in ticket revenue compared to just $4.5 billion in North America.

But the first half of 2022 has delivered a very different picture. Ticket sales in China totaled only $2.6 billion over the past six months, down 38 percent from the same period in 2021, according to data from exhibition industry consultancy Artisan Gateway. China’s strict “COVID-zero” approach to the pandemic continued to weigh on moviegoing in the country, as major population centers like Shenzhen and Shanghai were plunged into citywide lockdowns in response to omicron flareups. Frosty political relations between Washington and Beijing and an increasingly repressive political climate in China also resulted in fewer Hollywood films being granted release dates there, limiting the volume and frequency of bankable product on offer.

Total sales revenue in North America, meanwhile, made a healthy comeback in the first half of the year, as the studios began restoring exclusive theatrical windows for their biggest releases and pandemic restrictions shifted to the background of civic life. Thanks to huge domestic performances from blockbusters like Top Gun: Maverick ($571 million and counting) and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness ($410 million) — two titles that were denied release dates in China for vague political reasons — North American ticket revenue reached $3.6 billion in H1 2022, up from just $1 billion during the same period in 2021, according to Artisan Gateway’s estimates (sales are still trailing the pre-pandemic period, however; H1 2019 revenue was $5.7 billion).

The bad news for Hollywood is that U.S. studio films are earning less in China than they have in nearly a decade, despite the theatrical comeback stateside and elsewhere in the world. Tickets sales for Hollywood studio films totaled only $400 million in China in H1, a decline from $700 million last year — and prior to the pandemic, U.S. movies sold $1.9 billion worth of tickets in China in the first half of 2019.

“Pandemic control measures limited China’s H1 2022 gross box office and admissions to 2014-2015 levels, about 57.8 percent of pre-pandemic 1H 2019,” notes Rance Pow, president of Artisan Gateway. “And the gap between Chinese and imported films’ market share widened,” Pow adds, noting that Chinese-language films earned $2.2 billion over the past six months compared to the U.S. studios’ comparatively slight $400 million China take.

China’s box office has been as top-heavy as ever so far this year, with eight films comprising 60 percent of total revenue. The biggest earners were Bona Film Group’s nationalistic war epic The Battle at Lake Changjin II ($626 million), Xing Wenxiong’s Chinese comedy caper Too Cool To Kill ($217 million) and Wen Muye’s hit drama Nice View ($211 million).

Top Gun: Maverick‘s domestic total (now $571 million) could eventually catch up to Battle at Lake Changjin II‘s impressive China haul of $626 million — it’s a close race of rival propagandistic war films in terms of biggest home market sales total. But China still presents no challenge whatsoever to Hollywood moviemaking on a global basis. While Maverick has earned $544.5 million outside of North America (without a China release), Battle at Lake Changjin II has brought in less than $1 million from beyond China’s borders.

Artisan Gateway currently forecasts China’s box office to finish 2022 with approximately $5.2 billion (RMB 35 billion) in total revenue. Any earnings over that figure will be driven by the number and quality of imported films Beijing regulators decide to allow into the market, the company says. Many analysts expect North American ticket revenue to top $7.5 billion this year.

The big Chinese titles that are expected to drive local sales in the second half of the year include: Chen Sicheng’s sci-fi family comedy Mozart in Space (Wanda Media), Alibaba Pictures’ sci-fi Moon Man, comedy thriller Advancing of ZQ (Fun Age); the first film in Beijing Culture’s fantasy franchise Fenshen Trilogy, 3D animation New Gods: Yang Jian (Light Chaser), sci-fi adventure Deep Sea (Beijing Enlight), the long gestating Hong Kong sci-fi Warriors of Future (Media Asia), crime sequel The White Storm 3 (Universe Entertainment), and Bona Film Group’s latest nationalistic epics Anonymous and Ordinary Hero.
Interesting twist

[GeneChing]

Jul 4, 2022 9:44pm PT
Dire Warning Sounded as Hong Kong Film Industry Slowdown Continues (https://variety.com/2022/film/asia/hong-kong-film-industry-warning-1235308959/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/cte_extreme-ends-cr-res.jpg?crop=0px%2C134px%2C2552px%2C1437px&resize=681%2C383
Courtesy of Celestial Tiger Entertainment
The once vibrant Hong Kong film industry is struggling to recover from the effects of COVID and related problems, a local report has warned.

The report identified problems with theatrical box office, local production, co-production with mainland China and film investment.

The Motion Picture Industry Association and Hong Kong Box Office Ltd. regular half year report showed that cinemas in the city had been closed for 104 days this year, including Chinese New Year and Easter, both normally peak periods. Capacity restrictions remain in place as city authorities waver between trying to reopen the economy and a ‘dynamic zero’ COVID policy.

Actual cinema revenues in the first six month were little changed at HK$357 million ($45.5 million), compared with HK$376 million ($47.9 million). But only because the first half of 2021 was similarly affected by restrictions and cinemas were only open for 48 days.

The organizations note that box office takings were 66% lower than the $134 million registered in the first six months of 2019, the most recent pre-COVID year.

Just 73 films opened in the city’s cinemas during the first half of 2022, the vast majority of which were foreign imports.

“It can be seen that the Hong Kong film industry, including production and theatrical distribution sectors, have been very seriously affected by the epidemic,” the report says.

“Film production staff have been infected and cannot shoot. Actors and production teams in Hong Kong and [mainland] China are affected by 14 conditions, such as quarantine, which have affected the progress of works and discouraged investors, resulting in a sharp drop in production since 2021,” the report says. In recent years, large numbers of Hong Kong-initiated films have been co-produced with Mainland China partners or finance, meaning that conditions across the border have a spill-over effect in Hong Kong.

“Only six Hong Kong films were released in the first half of 2022. Output is low. Box office has plummeted. And no [local] film achieved HK$1 million in theaters, which is a miserable outcome,” the report continues.

In its heyday between the 1970s and 1990s, the Hong Kong film industry produced over 300 movies per year, including many in different Chinese dialects. In the decade before COVID, Hong Kong film output had fluctuated between 50-70 movies per year and the city had retained a key position in film finance and rights sales.

“The last Hong Kong government did not provide any support to the film industry, which is disappointing and a cause for complaint,” the report said. In fact, city authorities did provide direct subsidy to the cinema exhibition, but operators have been plagued with high rents and prolonged cinema closures and the cash injections did not prevent the collapse of the UA cinema chain in May 2021.

“It is hoped that the current government and its new team will face up to the difficulties of the film sector and lend a helping hand,” said the report. That is a reference to Hong Kong’s sixth term government under Chief Executive John Lee which took effect from July 1, 2022.

“Top Gun Maverick” was the top performing film of the period with HK$85.5 million ($11.1 million) to June 30. It was followed by “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” with a HK$65.5 million ($8.35 million) haul. In contrast, the top scoring Hong Kong-produced film was “Breakout Brothers 3,” with just HK$713,000 ($91,000) of theatrical revenue.
How fitting that Top Gun Maverick champions Hollywood USA

[GeneChing]

Aug 28, 2022 9:45pm PT
China Box Office: ‘New Gods: Yang Jian’ Repeats Weekend Win (https://variety.com/2022/film/asia/china-box-office-new-gods-yang-jian-second-weekend-1235353092/)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/New-Gods-Yang-Jian.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
Courtesy of GKIDS


Chinese animation film “New Gods: Yang Jian” was the top film at the mainland China box office for the second successive weekend.

Unchallenged by major new releases, the film earned $13.0 (RMB88.3 million) between Friday and Sunday, according to data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway. That was a drop of 34% compared with its $19.8 million opening session.

Some $1.5 million of the weekend total was scored from the film’s outing on Imax screens.

After ten days on release “Yang Jian” has a cumulative total of $43.7 million (RMB297 million). Of that, its Imax total is now $4 million.

“New Gods: Yang Jian” is a continuation of the “New Gods” franchise from Light Chaser Animation, the studio behind 2021 hit “New Gods: Nezha Reborn” and 2019’s “White Snake.” The new film revolves around Yang Jian, a mythological figure from the Ming Dynasty and who was featured in historical novel “The Investiture of the Gods.”

Previous chart topper “Moon Man” was not far behind, but remained in second place. It earned $12.2 million (RMB83.3 million) and now has a cumulative of $421 million (RMB2.86 billion) since releasing on July 29.

“Warriors of Future,” a Hong Kong-produced sci-fi title, earned $7.4 million (RMB50.6 million) in third place over the weekend. Since releasing on Aug. 5, it has now amassed $88.5 million (RMB602 million).

“Minions: The Rise of Gru” earned $6.5 million (RMB44.4 million) in its second weekend, a drop of 44% from its $11.6 million debut. It now has $24.4 million (RMB166 million) from ten days in Chinese theaters.

Overseas media have reported that Chinese authorities changed the film’s ending to show that crime does not pay. Chinese viewers seem to like it well enough. On the Taopiaopiao ticketing platform they gave it a mean 8.8 out of 10 approval rating. On Maoyan the score was 9.0.

The highest-ranking new release film was Japanese animation “Belle” which took 1.5 million (RMB10.4 million) and placed fifth.

With three animated titles in the top five and the chart looking less than fresh, the nationwide box office total over the weekend slipped to $45.6 million. The running total for the year-to-date is now $3.57 billion, some 26% below the equivalent score at the same point in 2021.
New Gods: Yang Jian (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72369-New-Gods-Yang-Jian)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

Oct 1, 2023 10:36pm PT
Chinese Films Take First, Third and Fifth Places at Global Box Office on Holiday Weekend (https://variety.com/2023/film/asia/chinese-films-first-third-fifth-places-global-box-office-1235741925/#:~:text=A%20clutch%20of%20Chinese%20movies,U.S.%2 Dbased%20data%20service%20Comscore.)

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Under-the-Light-1-cr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
Enlight Pictures

A clutch of Chinese movies released for the end of September holiday season dominated the global box office over the latest weekend. Mainland Chinese-produced films took first, third and fifth places across the planet, according to U.S.-based data service Comscore.

Comscore shows “Under the Light,” which released only in mainland China, grossing an estimated $54 million between Friday and Sunday. That put it ahead of Paramount’s “Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie,” which earned an estimated $23.0 million in the North America (aka ‘domestic’) market and a further $23.1 million in the rest of the world, for a weekend total of $46.1 million.

In third place globally was another Chinese film “The Ex-Files 4: The Marriage Plan,” which released in China and five other territories for a weekend total of $41.4 million. (That included $66,000 from North America.) “The Creator” earned $32.3 million across the planet, comprising an $18.3 million international score and $14 million from North America. Fifth, planetwide, was Chinese propaganda movie “The Volunteers: To the War,” which released in two territories and scored $30.8 million, according to Comscore estimates.

Providing top five China figures considered as definitive, consultancy firm Artisan Gateway, shows that the Middle Kingdom enjoyed one of its five biggest box office weekends this year. Artisan Gateway reports the nationwide aggregate at $168 million, between Friday and Sunday.

The holiday period in China continues over the next several days, combining the moveable feast of Mid Autumn festival with the People’s Republic of China’s National Day holiday that starts on Oct. 1, and for many becomes an eight-day “Golden Week.”

“Under the Light” is a neon-lit drama directed by Zhang Yimou and mark’s Zhang’s second major hit film to be released this year, after “Full River Red,” released at Lunar New Year. “Under the Light,” stretches across multiple themes including crime and anti-corruption efforts, and is reported to be Zhang’s most tightly plotted film in a while. It features a cast of top mainland stars including: Zhang Guoli, Yu Hewei, Joan Chen, Zhou Dongyu, and Lei Jiayin.

Artisan Gateway reports it as earning $55.5 million (RMB393 million) between Friday and Sunday. Including its advanced opening on Thursday, it finished Sunday with a four-day cumulative of $62.6 million (RMB451 million).

Urban romantic comedy, “The Ex-Files 4: The Marriage Plan” also got a Thursday release and grossed $41.4 million (RMB300 million) between Friday and Sunday. Over its four opening days, its total was $54.3 million, for the Huayi Brothers studio.

Imax reported that “Under the Light” earned $3.9 million on its screens in China and that “The Ex-Files 4: The Marriage Plan” enjoyed $1.1 million of its total from its venues.

“The Volunteers,” is the first part of a new trilogy directed by Chen Kaige (director of Palme d’Or winner and double Oscar nominated “Farewell My Concubine”) celebrating the victories of the China’s People’s Volunteer Army during the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea (1950-1953), known in the west as the Korean War. It earned $31 million (RMB223 million) between Friday and Sunday and $34.7 million over four days, according to Artisan Gateway.

The same provider shows comedy actioner “Moscow Mission” releasing on Friday and earning $23.2 million (RMB166 million) in fourth place at the China box office.

“Paw Patrol” proved an exception to the rule that normally bars Hollywood imports from new releases during key Chinese holidays. It released on Friday and earned $5.4 million (RMB38.8 million) in China over its opening three days, Artisan Gateway reports.

The bumper weekend lifted China’s box office for the year-to-date to a total of $6.39 billion. That is some 77% ahead of the COVID-hit 2022 and trails the last pre-COVID, 2019, by only 5%, according to Artisan Gateway. Looking forward to the new Chen Kaige & Zhang Yimou films.

[GeneChing]

Oct 15, 2023 8:55pm PT
China Box Office: Zhang Yimou’s ‘Under the Light’ Retains Weekend Leadership (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/newreply.php?p=1325416&noquote=1)

By Patrick Frater
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Under-the-Light-1-cr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
Enlight Pictures

A dearth of new release films allowed Zhang Yimou’s “Under the Light” to retain a comfortable lead at the China box office over the weekend, in its third week of release.

The contemporary crime drama film earned $13.5 million (RMB97.2 million) between Friday and Sunday, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. Since releasing on Sept. 28, it has accumulated gross revenues of $163 million (RMB1.17 billion).

Zhang will be feted with a lifetime achievement award in Japan next week, where the Tokyo International Film Festival will play his February record breaker “Full River Red,” but not “Under the Light.”

“The Volunteers: To the War,” a 1950s-set propaganda film directed by Chen Kaige, earned $9.6 million (RMB69.2 million) and rose from third to second place. It now has a cumulative of $93.2 million. Chinese comedy franchise film “The Ex-Files 4: Marriage Plan” took $8.8 million in its third week of release, advancing its cumulative to $123 million.

“Moscow Mission” was close behind, with $8.4 million. That extended its three-weekend cumulative total to $76.3 million. “Lose to Win,” another holiday season release, earned $2.2 million in its third weekend. Since debuting on Sept. 28, it has accumulated $21.1 million.

After a strong summer season that helped overall box office numbers in China to recover most of their pre-COVID might, a familiar pattern of seasonality and holiday-driven releasing appears to be re-emerging in the Middle Kingdom. National Geographic documentary “Jane,” about naturalist Jane Goodall, is due a release in the coming days, but the next major Hollywood tentpole to arrive in China is “The Marvels,” on Nov. 10.

The latest weekend saw aggregate nationwide grosses of $47.1 million, propelling the year-to-date total to $6.71 billion. Artisan Gateway calculates that as 76% ahead of COVID-struck 2022, and 10% behind the same point in 2019.

Do I need to make a 'Under the Light' thread?

[GeneChing]

More on Hi, Mom here (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising&p=1321718#post1321718)


Sony Lands Remake Rights to China Box Office Smash ‘Hi, Mom’ (EXCLUSIVE) (https://variety.com/2023/film/news/sony-remake-hi-mom-china-box-office-smash-1235760121/#:~:text=Sony%20Pictures%20has%20acquired%20the,di rected%20by%20a%20solo%20female.)

By Patrick Frater
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Hi-Mom-and-Laura-Kosann-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
Beijing Culture, CAA.

Sony Pictures has acquired the English-language remake rights to Chinese comedy drama, “Hi, Mom,” which until recently overtaken by “Barbie” had been the world’s highest grossing film directed by a solo female.

The original picture, directed by Jia Ling and released in early 2021, sees a young woman whose mother has been fatally injured in a car accident, travel back to the early 1980s where she becomes best friend to the younger version of her mother. That enables her to work on giving her mother a better life than first time around.

Variety‘s review of the picture said it had an “inspired storytelling switch” and was “a top-notch tearjerker that will have viewers everywhere reaching for the tissues.”

Laura Kosann is in the early stages of development, and is adapting the screenplay with Escape Artists’ Todd Black, Jason Blumenthal, Steve Tisch and Becky Sanderman producing along with Wenxin She (“A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood”). Jia is also attached as executive producer.

Repped by CAA, Kosann is a 2021 Academy Nicholl Fellow and has had three features on the annual Black List in the past two years. She is adapting the comic book “Mercy Sparx” for MGM and The Picture Company as well as rewriting a live-action Christmas musical entitled “Santa is Real” for Amazon.

“I am looking forward to this cooperation and I am so glad that my story with my mom can be shared with more people. I believe that while everyone’s story with their mom is unique, the love in these stories is universal and something we can all resonate with,” Jia said.

The original story, known in Chinese as “Hello, Li Huanying,” Jia’s late mother’s real name, was developed by Jia from a comedy sketch of the same name that she wrote in 2016. Production of the feature began in 2019 with production by Beijing Jingxi Culture.

Jia co-starred as the young woman, while Zhang Xiaofei played the younger version of her mother.
“Hi, Mom” was released in February 2021, timed to coincide with the Chinese New Year peak box office season, and grossed RMB5.41 billion (some $841 million at current exchange rates), making it the third highest performing film of all time in China.

The film likely benefitted from the empathy of many audiences separated from their own families by COVID restrictions. But it also scored highly on audience ratings charts and earned screenplay and directing awards for Jia and multiple acting awards for Zhang.

[GeneChing]

Why Hollywood’s China Syndrome Is Both Meltdown and Opportunity (https://www.aol.com/why-hollywood-china-syndrome-both-124525622.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWFyY2gueWFob28uY29tLw&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAKUpbxyiDx4lmZw2Fp01Ryxo8Ls0 SY5iJAw1iv_OkqGpFi55TOIl3XufUyJwVRABZSq9ljYNhqKm2i Ahbb3RiGTMddWgkl3tUzTItgVkB0Mag3AkVJcEk3DnJBK74fGT 2ZO5uBSw2-PrQWGfDwZzwFcEi8_GUVC3we0OE1u3z-Qe)
Variety
PATRICK FRATER
December 21, 2023 at 4:45 AM

https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/bY.lX95UmG_jh7y3ykmLcA--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTEyNDI7aD04Mjg-/https://media.zenfs.com/en/aol_variety_168/357b7ad120b7fa423355cd6a061e78be

It seems Hollywood’s “sequel-itis” has reached China’s box office too.

Despite the country’s dramatic overnight removal of COVID restrictions in December 2022 and film imports quickly restarting with the triumphant debut of “Avatar: The Way of Water,” Hollywood’s new normal in the Middle Kingdom bears little resemblance to its pre-pandemic status.

During the three-year disruption of 2020-22, caused by the pandemic and soured U.S.-China diplomatic relations, few Hollywood films — and no Marvel titles — made their way onto Chinese screens.

But if Hollywood studios read the $240 million-grossing “Avatar 2” feeding frenzy as a sign that pent-up Chinese demand for their sequels and superheroes slate might continue throughout 2023, they were sorely disappointed.

In the world’s second-largest box office territory, with a cume to date of $7.3 billion, the market share for all imported films in China has crashed, standing at less than 15% at the beginning of December. Hollywood films’ share is just 12%, consultancy Artisan Gateway calculates.

This month, “Napoleon” and “Wonka” have continued the trend of dismal flops, with $5 million and $3 million opening weekends, respectively.

The slump is particularly disappointing given that the Chinese authorities that carefully control the film industry have this year made several moves designed to put Hollywood releasing back on the rails. Along with reopening the import spigot, they’ve reduced their blackout periods (seasons when only new Chinese titles get releases), sped up the approvals process to allow longer marketing lead times, and allowed release dates in China to be synchronized with those of U.S. and international outings.

To no avail. Chinese audiences have seemingly moved on from American franchises and Tom Cruise-style individualism.

“I grew up watching every possible Hollywood film,” says Yang Xianghua, president of movies at Chinese streaming giant iQiyi. “Now, not so much.”

The waning power of Hollywood’s franchises is not a problem unique to China. But the scale and proficiency of the local competition is.

The Chinese government has corralled billions of dollars into creating a technically adept production sector, and top directors are being pressured to deliver “main melody,” or patriotic, movies.

Within these guardrails, new genres have flourished, including formerly taboo sci-fi films (such as “The Wandering Earth II,” which this year earned $570 million) and crime stories with Chinese characteristics (“No More Bets,” which grossed $544 million). That said, the year’s biggest film is the $645 million-grossing costume drama “Full River Red,” by veteran director Zhang Yimou, albeit one stuffed with allegories for contemporary audiences.

“Many popular local films are adapted from true stories or from ordinary people’s lives, relatable to real life. Also, the recent rise of crime/suspense dramas feature unpredictable and clever storytelling that keep the audience guessing and interested. Story endings are hard to predict, sometimes a surprise, and become hot topics for people to discuss. Hollywood sequels have become predicable from beginning to the end,” says Artisan Gateway principal Rance Pow.

Infrastructure, too, increasingly favors Chinese content. Streamers have been weaned off imported content by intrusive vetting and censorship processes. And the government has directed the building of nearly 100,000 cinemas. As venues reach into smaller cities, so the audience interest in foreign stars and stories diminishes.

According to China’s latest annual film yearbook, many Chinese viewers consider local films to have improved in quality in recent years. At the same time, 25% think that imported films have run out of ideas.

“Chinese moviegoers are showing declining interest in works focused on superheroes. While these films historically performed well in Mainland China, only ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3’ stood out this year,” said a spokesman for Chinese ticketing, data and distribution firm Maoyan.

Yet the more creative end of Hollywood’s spectrum still has plenty of potential.

“Chinese filmmakers have learned how to do big blockbusters with special effects, but they are still limited — only in part by censorship — when it comes to storytelling,” says Stanley Rosen, a professor of political science and international relations at USC. He points to the bright feminism of “Barbie” ($35 million box office in China) and the nuclear debate raised in “Oppenheimer” ($65 million) as examples of storytelling concepts that are still beyond what is open to Chinese filmmakers.

Still, American studios would be unwise to pander to Chinese audiences any time soon. U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher’s Select Committee on the CCP proceedings seem determined to prevent Hollywood from amending scripts or otherwise appealing to Chinese political sensibilities. And so, the gap between U.S. output and Chinese audiences may persist.

But China may now be offering Hollywood another opening. Industry sources have told Variety that the import quota for revenue-sharing films — the system by which Chinese authorities control how many and which foreign films come into the country, currently set at 34 films per year — has quietly been dropped. Box office consultancy Gower Street Analytics calculates that the number may already have surpassed 37 this year.

The apparent thinking is that Hollywood is no longer a threat to the local film industry and that the removal of quotas would ease an ongoing trade dispute and further stimulate the Chinese box office.

“China has used quotas both as a sword and a shield. In the early days, they were a shield to keep the local industry protected so that they weren’t overwhelmed by the very popular Hollywood films, while still getting the benefit of those films to be able to build their cinemas. Now they’re not that concerned anymore about the competition,” says Jean Prewitt, president and CEO at the Independent Film & Television Alliance, which represents film companies outside the Hollywood system. She says that neither U.S. studios nor independents were aware of any change to the quota regime.

Even if the quotas don’t crumble, China still wants to boost box office revenue.

In recent months, it has begun testing a “segmented” or “branch distribution” system that introduces a modicum of market forces. It permits exhibitors and private sector distributors, rather than a state-owned enterprise, to be responsible for bringing in and releasing imported titles. So far, the system has only been tried for minor rereleases.

The Dec. 22 reissue of “La La Land” will be its highest-profile usage. And “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour,” now set for a Dec. 31 outing, may be the first for a current title.

“They are desperate to bring in this non-studio title which will play premium large-format venues,” says one China-focused U.S. executive. “It seems that the Chinese government can still pull whatever lever it wants to engineer the desired marketplace result.”

And with China’s box office still below 2019 levels, there’s every reason to expect that behind-the-scenes levers will continue to be pulled. Some things don’t change.

Is Marvel still in the game here with Superhero Fatigue?

[GeneChing]

Jan 3, 2024 12:01am PT
China Box Office Surges by Annual 83% in 2023 to $7.73 Billion (https://variety.com/2024/film/news/china-box-office-2023-surge-1235860299/#!)
Recovery after COVID year was dramatic, but imported films fared no better than in 2022.

By Patrick Frater

https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Full-River-Red-DSC05823-cr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
Courtesy of Edko Films

Chinese-produced movies took all of the top ten chart places at the China box office as theatrical revenues in 2023 rebounded strongly. Gross revenues reached an annual total of RMB54.9 billion or $7.73 billion.

That was an 83% improvement on the previous year, according to data from China Film Administration, but still 14.5% adrift of 2019, the last pre-COVID year, when grosses hit RMB64.3 billion. The government body also said that 2023 was the fourth highest box office figure on record.

Comparisons with 2022 are less meaningful than in many other countries as China suffered the worst of the pandemic in that year and cinemas were subject to eight months of rolling closures and capacity restrictions. In 2020 and 2021, when much of the world was laboring under COVID restrictions, but China was operating largely normally, the Middle Kingdom was the biggest movie market on the planet.

Local ticketing firm Maoyan reported that the number of admissions in 2023 was the highest in four years, at 1.3 billion. That is fractionally below one cinema visit per person in the massive country.

Although the market was largely re-opened to imported titles, Chinese-made films accounted for an 84% share of the total box office market, according to consultancy firm Artisan Gateway. Imports accounted for 16%. The proportions were little changed from the more restricted 2022.

“Fast X,” with RMB985 million or $139 million, was the top-scoring imported movie. It was followed in that category by two Japanese animation titles “Suzume” (with $114 million) and “The First Slam Dunk” ($93 million).

Two locally-produced films released at Chinese New Year, “Full River Red” and “The Wandering Earth 2,” headed the annual chart and exceeded the RMB4 billion ($560 million) landmark.

Maoyan said that recovery in 2023 was propelled by expansion of cinema operations into smaller towns and cities and rural areas, a growing trend of parent-child moviegoing, and changing demographics, notably an expanded female audience aged 25 and above.

The health of the cinema exhibition sector remains in some question. China Film Administration reports that the country had 86,300 cinema screens in operation at the end of 2023. That compares with 69,800 in 2019, when box office was higher. Per screen average revenues, then have dropped from a mean RMB921,000 ($129,000) per year to RMB63,600 ($89,000).

“The [Chinese] film market experienced changes in terms of content, audience, and promotion. Diversified films were welcomed by the market, with hits in the genres of history, sci-fi and fantasy. Young audiences sought new content and new topics. Male audiences were the main audience for imported animation films, while female audiences tended to choose parent-child animation and films focusing on women’s issues. Young audiences were more inclined to pay for films with creative settings and novel topics,” said Maoyan.

The agency also underlined the market’s growing seasonality and event-driven performance. “The demand for family [films] exploded during holidays and festivals, which was much higher than the average. In 2023, the summer season box office was the strongest in history, contributing nearly 40% of the year’s box office, while the Spring Festival holidays box office ranked second with a 12.3% contribution,” it said. Wonder how the upcoming Spring Festival will do...

[GeneChing]

Feb 7, 2024 2:00am PT
China Box Office Preview: Can 8 Films Deliver a $1 Billion Lunar New Year Sequel? (https://variety.com/2024/film/news/chinese-new-year-box-office-preview-pegasus-2-yolo-1235899229/)
Zhang Yimou, Han Han, Jia Ling and Ning Hao all compete for eyeballs in a crowded holiday season
By Patrick Frater
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/MixCollage-06-Feb-2024-06-53-PM-2873-cr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
CMC Capital, Enlight Media

Eight Chinese-language films release simultaneously this weekend in mainland China and will vie for a slice of the Lunar New Year holiday box office business.

The week-long nationwide holiday period has in recent years become the most lucrative season for cinemas, and key films stake out their slot in the release calendar months or years in advance.

The new Chinese films all debut on Saturday (Friday is the normal day for releases in China) and should have an unchallenged two weeks on screen. But if the new Chinese films don’t perform well, there is already a string of new Hollywood releases queuing up for screen time, starting with “Argylle” on Feb. 23.

The week-long holiday this year officially runs Feb. 10-17, but employers are encouraged to give workers time off on Friday, Feb. 9 as well, ostensibly giving city dwellers time to return to their native villages and family seats in the countryside before the official start to festivities. The upheaval is sometimes described as the world’s largest annual migration.

Commentators are divided as to whether the 2024 season will be bigger than last year, when tickets worth $1 billion were sold in what may have been a frenzy of “revenge spending” following a miserable COVID-hit 2022.

Zhang Tong, senior analyst at China’s Maoyan Research Institute, estimates that the 2024 figure could come in at RMB 7-8 billion or $975 million to $1.1 billion. But comparisons may not be on equal footing as the extra dates make this “the longest Spring Holiday ever.”

“Current feedback shows that audiences are relatively positive about the Spring Festival movies this year and we are optimistic about the box office,” Zhang told Variety.

Last year’s top titles were Zhang Yimou’s period comedy drama “Full River Red,” which earned a career total of RMB4.55 billion ($633 million), and blockbuster sci-fi sequel “The Wandering Earth II,” which pulled in RMB4.03 billion ($561 million).

In 2024, both macro and micro conditions may weigh against box office records. At the macro level, China’s economy failed to rebound as strongly as had been hoped after COVID and is beset by a string of problems including the housing sector crisis (which weighs on saving and sentiment), high youth unemployment and strains on international trade. Other commentators point to weather and transport problems as possibly delaying or reducing cinema attendance.

The current crop of new Chinese fare offers fewer franchises than last year and productions made on lower budgets, according to state media. Also, local streaming platforms are offering a rich crop of new titles, thus giving spectators more reason to stay at home.

Pre-sales ticketing data suggests that the two theatrical frontrunners are: “Pegasus 2,” a car-racing comedy sequel to director and former racing driver Han Han’s 2019 hit of the same title, which pulled in $255 million; and “YOLO,” a warm-hearted comedy about appreciating oneself, reportedly adapted from the Japanese film “100 Yen Love.” “YOLO” is the second film by Jia Ling, the newcomer who touched millions of hearts with her time-travel tearjerker “Hi, Mom” at Chinese New Year in 2021. It earned a stunning RMB5.41 billion ($752 million).

Currently tracking in third place is “Article 20,” a light drama from Zhang Yimou that takes its title from the concept of justifiable defense in Chinese criminal law.

Tracking fourth, for now, is “The Movie Emperor,” a satirical comedy in which Hong Kong superstar Andy Lau allows himself to be humiliated and pilloried in a dissection of celebrity in the digital age. Classily directed by reliable hitmaker Ning Hao (“Crazy Racer,” “Crazy Racer”), the film premiered last fall in Toronto and was the closing film of the Busan Festival. But it pushed back its commercial release date and is gambling on China’s upcoming holiday season instead.

“Vida La Vida,” which sees two sick youngsters on a healing journey, is one of the few new-release titles that is not a comedy.

The session will also feature a trio of animation titles – the annual “Boonie Bears” franchise title, this one called “Time Twist” – and “Ba Jie,” directed by He Ranhao about demons, sacred artefacts and the entry to Heaven. “Huang Pi: God of Wealth Cat,” which uses motion capture for an animated tale about a multi-lingual cat who dispenses money, is also in the frame, but appears to have started its promotional campaign later than the others and early data from Maoyan shows it eighth in the pre-sales stakes.

China has the world’s largest installed base of Imax premium large format screens and the company has spent several years encouraging Chinese filmmakers to either shoot with Imax-approved technologies or to screen their finished pictures in its format. Four Chinese movies will show in Imax cinemas over the holiday season: “YOLO,” “Article 20,” “Boonie Bears: Time Twist, and “Pegasus 2.”

“The eventual Chinese New Year winner is sure to come from one of ‘YOLO,’ ‘Pegasus 2’ or ‘Article 20’,” said Maoyan’s Zhang. “Though with parent-child audiences ‘Boonie Bears’ is clearly the preferred choice.”

2024-Year-of-the-Dragon (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72589-2024-Year-of-the-Dragon)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)

[GeneChing]

Feb 18, 2024 11:13pm PT
China Box Office: Four Chinese Films Dominate Global Cinema Revenues as Lunar New Year Haul Tops $1.1 Billion (https://variety.com/2024/film/news/chinese-films-dominate-global-cinema-box-office-revenues-1235915972/#:~:text=Chinese%20ticketing%20agency%2C%20Maoyan% 20calculates,of%20the%20holidays%20this%20year.)

By Patrick Frater
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/YOLO-PR-Poster-lcr-res.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
Courtesy of Sony Pictures


Four Chinese films dominated the mainland China and global box office charts over the latest weekend. “YOLO,” a comedy drama about weight loss and self-discovery, was crowned as the top earning film worldwide for a second weekend running.

“YOLO” took $86.5 million (RMB614 million) between Friday and Sunday, giving it a 9-day cumulative total of $402 million (RMB2.85 million), according to data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway.

The second film by Jia Ling, who previously directed 2021 Lunar New Year smash hit “Hi, Mom”, “YOLO” released on Saturday, Feb. 10 and has retained the number one position since the second day of the Chinese New Year holidays, staying narrowly ahead of racing comedy “Pegasus 2.”

Over the latest weekend “Pegasus 2” earned $80.6 million, giving it a running total of $356 million.

“Article 20,” the Zhang Yimou-directed legal comedy, improved significantly. It climbed up one place to third in the Chinese and global weekend charts and earned $70.2 million over the weekend. That compared with an opening weekend of $47.6 million and gives it a 9-day cumulative of $207 million.

Chinese animation “Boonie Bears: Time Twist” slipped to fourth in the Chinese weekend chart and fifth globally. (On the global chart provided by ComScore, “Bob Marley: One Love” took fourth spot, earning $56.7 million from 48 territories, including North America.) “Boonie Bears” added $52 million over the weekend for a 9-day cumulative of $209 million.

A long way behind, Ning Hao’s Andy Lau-starring “The Movie Emperor” took fifth place over the weekend in China. It took $1.3 million for a cumulative of $11.9 million.

Chinese ticketing agency, Maoyan calculates that the Lunar New Year or Chinese New Year holiday period brought in record box revenue of RMB8.02 billion or $1.11 billion, an 18% increase on 2023. But the agency previously said that comparison with prior years was not exact, due to the timing of the holidays this year. In mainland China, the holidays welcoming in the Year of the Dragon officially ran Saturday to Saturday (Feb. 10-17), but some folk may have taken the latest Sunday as leave, as well, making for an unusually long holiday.

In its latest note, Maoyan said that 163 million tickets were sold over the holiday period. That was a 26% year-on-year increase and implies that mean ticket prices were lower. Maoyan says that ticket prices over the holiday period dropped 6% to RMB49.1 ($6.82) apiece, reflecting both price cutting in the major metropolises and the skewing of attendance to third and fourth tier towns and cities, which this time accounted for 58% of box office business.

Artisan Gateway calculates that China’s running box office haul for the 2024 calendar year is $1.62 billion. That is some 14% behind 2023 levels, but the gap could be narrowed if the top titles have staying power or if the upcoming crop of Hollywood titles find good traction.


2024-Year-of-the-Dragon (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?72589-2024-Year-of-the-Dragon)
Chollywood-rising (https://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?57225-Chollywood-rising)