China

China’s answer to Top Gun is a movie called Born to Fly which was to open on September 30, in time for the week-long National Day holiday celebrations starting October 1. However, it was pulled from release with no reason given aside from a vague announcement that it needed to “improve special effects,” according to radii.

An interesting heads-up from Sonny Bunch writing in the Washington Post on September 15 – Chinese businesses are increasingly buying up international video game companies. Why this is worrying is that the size of the international gaming market dwarfs that of the global box office, and all video games bought by the Chinese are subject to the same censorship that is applied by the ministry of culture to movies that are approved for the Chinese audience – no Tibetan references, no time travel, ghost stories, gambling, violence or nudity.

As cinemas across China continue to open despite sporadic Covid-related lockdowns in certain areas, the box office grosses have rebounded with local releases and a little help from Hollywood, specifically Jurassic World: Dominion which is the only US film on the top ten list, coming in at No. 4 this weekend.

The big release this weekend in China is Universal’s Jurassic World: Dominion which opened to $14. 9 million on Friday, June 10 on 60,000 screens -- only about 75% of Chinese cinemas.

In 2020, China passed the US to become the biggest box office territory in the world. In 2021, the China Film Administration put out a five-year plan to “adhere to the party’s total leadership over film work.

While Disney is celebrating the $265 million international opening week numbers for Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, there is no China release for the movie.

Box office in China continues to fall due to Covid lockdowns causing cinema closures, with double-digit drops in box office revenues compared to last year’s numbers. Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore held on to its No.

China flexed its muscle as the world’s largest film market during the recent five-day May Day and Labor Day weekend. The box office total of the top three movies alone reached more than $124 million.

On a week when there was only one major new film release (Nomadland) in America, the biggest box office action was still happening in China. Two movies, Hi, Mom and Detective Chinatown 3, posted spectacular cumulative earnings of $624 million and $621 million, respectively.

In a spectacular rebound after COVID-19 closed theaters and dampened last year’s Lunar New Year, traditionally the busiest moviegoing period, China posted record-breaking box office numbers this time around, boosting its status as the world’s largest film market. A hopeful sign for Hollywood studios that have delayed the release of its tentpole movies worldwide, Chinese box office action sizzled this past weekend.