7/29/2023 0 Comments Stay afloat![]() But nonetheless, they were causing these surges in box office sales.Ĭhinese authorities made it clear. And by the late '90s, only a handful of American movies were flowing into China. ![]() And the Chinese audiences, who had essentially been shut off to Hollywood's influence in the 20th century, started to do what audiences around the world had done decades prior - they flocked to the theater to see American films. I think The Fugitive made around $3 million, which is nothing to a studio as big as Warner Bros., but was an absolute blockbuster in Chinese terms. And despite having this massive population, the Chinese box office was still really small. sent the first American movie over, which was Harrison Ford's The Fugitive, to screen in a theater, and a contract was drawn up that only sent 13% of ticket sales back to Warner Bros., so this was a really paltry amount. suggested to a very prominent theater owner that Western movies might help the theaters recover. So the theaters were really struggling, and in 1994, an executive who was stationed in the region for Warner Bros. And if movies were popular, it often was because they were pirated and available for sale on the city corner. After the Cultural Revolution, Chinese movie theaters reopened, but they really struggled because really, the only thing that the government had to offer were these very medicinal propagandistic films, and they were really the only show in town until things like television or even karaoke lounges gave people something a little bit more fun to do. This is a time when companies like Boeing were moving into China. China's economy was modernizing and opening up to the world. It started in 1994, and a couple of things were happening at the time. On China opening up to American films in the '90s He contends that China has watched as Hollywood films helped sell America to the world - and it wants to do the same. In his new book, Red Carpet: Hollywood, China and the Global Battle for Cultural Supremacy, Schwartzel writes about China's growing influence on Hollywood. "I go to the movies now and I can see the Chinese cell phone - even if it's blurred in the frame." ![]() Schwartzel has trained his eye to spot what he calls "Chinese elements" in movies: "You'll start to see it everywhere," he says. The movie has since been overtaken at the box office by a string of other blockbusters, but Schwartzel says its influence lingers. In another scene from the same film, a character buys Chinese protein powder at a Chicago convenience store.Īnd just 10 days after its release, Age of Extinction became the highest grossing film of all time in China. He highlights a few notable situations of product placement: In the 2014 film Transformers: Age of Extinction, Mark Wahlberg's character withdraws money from a China Construction Bank ATM - while in Texas. Today's Hollywood blockbusters are specifically being crafted to appeal to Chinese audiences - and pass muster with the Chinese government - according to Wall Street Journal reporter Erich Schwartzel. ![]() Audience members sit separately for social distancing at a cinema in China's eastern Zhejiang province in July 2020. ![]()
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