Tag Archives: Pixar

‘Cold War’ Off to Hot Start in China

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Follow me on Twitter @robcain or Sina Weibo @robcain, or connect with me on LinkedIn.By Robert Cain for China Film Biz

November 13, 2012

The Hong Kong cops and robber thriller Cold War got off to a hot start last week with a $15.4 million 4-day debut, enough to make it the 3rd best Chinese language opener of 2012 and 12th best among all PRC debuts this year. For first-time writer-director Sunny Luk and his all-star cast, Cold War warmed up what had been a moribund Chinese box office, marking the strongest opening for any film on the mainland since Expendables 2 knocked off $25 million in its opening weekend two months ago.

 

Produced and distributed by Bill Kong’s EDKO Films and starring Aaron Kwok, Tony Leung, Andy Lau, Byron Mann and Aarif Lee, Cold War will likely rack up another strong week before serious competition shows up at Chinese theaters, with the 3D re-release of 2012 arriving on November 20th and Life of Pi drifting in on the 22nd. Mega-director Feng Xiaogang’s Back to 1942 will almost certainly freeze out Cold War when it debuts on November 29th.

Reaching $31 million in its third week, The Bourne Legacy is now Universal’s 2nd best performer in China this year after the surprise hit Battleship. With a few more weeks left in its run, Bourne should easily surpass the low end of the $35 million to $50 million range that I had predicted for it.

Wreck-it Ralph’s 6-day opening tally of $5 million continues Disney/Pixar’s long string of misfires in China. The only consolation for Wreck-It Ralph is that it didn’t open as poorly as Brave, which managed a tepid $4.6 million over its entire PRC run back in June. Disney/Pixar’s last truly successful animation release in the PRC was more than two years ago when Toy Story 3 tallied a then respectable $16 million box office total over its 4-week run in 2010.

 

Bait 3D wound up its extraordinary run by biting off another $500,000 to finish at $25.7 million, by far the best performance ever in China for an Australian film, and the biggest gross for any non-Hollywood import.

Aggregate weekly national box office was $39.3 million, down 23 percent relative to the same week last year. But the year-to-date tally of $2.13 billion is already 3 percent ahead of the full-year total for 2011, and with 7 weeks left in the year, China is well on its way to setting yet another annual box office record.

Robert Cain is a producer and entertainment industry consultant who has been doing business in China since 1987. He can be reached at rob@pacificbridgepics.com and at www.pacificbridgepics.com.

Pixar’s Persistent China Drought

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by Robert Cain for China Film Biz

July 3, 2012

Pixar’s newest release, Brave, the tale of a rebellious princess who turns her mother into a bear, had a bear of a time at the Chinese box office last week, clawing out just $3.1 million during its first 6 days of release ending June 24th.

While other studios’ animated feature films have prospered in China’s theaters, Pixar’s films have consistently underperformed there. Brave earned 60 percent less in its first week than Madagascar 3 did in its third, and the Pixar film also trailed far behind a poorly reviewed Taiwanese action film, Black and White Episode I, that opened against it last week.

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While non-Pixar animated films during the past 2 years have taken in an average of about 7 percent of their worldwide box office grosses from China, Pixar’s films have earned less than 2 percent of their worldwide grosses there during the same period. Every one of Pixar’s recent releases has lagged far behind other U.S. animated films.

 

Pixar’s poor performance cannot be explained by inferior distribution or marketing, since virtually all major Hollywood animated films are handled in China by the same two companies, China Film Group and Huaxia, often working together. Rather, there seems to be something about the Pixar stories, and the way audiences perceive them, that leaves Chinese audiences cold. Whatever the reasons, the performance gap is so striking, and so consistent, that Pixar and Disney will want to address their shortcomings in China if they are to compete effectively against their rivals.

Robert Cain is a producer and entertainment industry consultant who has been doing business in China since 1987. He can be reached at rob@pacificbridgepics.com and at www.pacificbridgepics.com.