Tag Archives: Police Story 2013

China’s Dismal December Gives Way to Jubilant January and Fantastic February

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By Robert Cain for China Film Biz

February 13, 2014

If you were keeping tabs on China’s box office activity back in December you might have concluded that something was seriously wrong. Expected blockbusters like Personal Tailor and Police Story 2013 did fine, but fell short of expectations. Many other pictures failed to click. It seemed that the inexorable rise of cinema-going in China was finally, inevitably, slowing down. Unlike December 2012, which smashed all previously monthly records to become China’s highest grossing month of all time, December 2013 saw a precipitous 12 percent year-on-year drop in ticket revenue, despite a 39 percent increase in operating cinema screens.

If you were following all of this as it happened you might have said to yourself “All good things must come to an end.” Right?

Oh ye of little faith!

Mainland moviegoers shrugged off the December doldrums like they never happened, and halfway through 2014’s first quarter they’ve set a ticket buying pace that’s galloping along like, well, a horse.  A Kentucky Derby winner, that is.

To wit: January 31st, the first day of Chinese New Year, set a new box office record  set as the biggest single day ever in Chinese history, at 258 million RMB ($43.7 million); The Monkey King 3D set a new single-film record for the biggest ever opening day in China at 122 million RMB (besting Iron Man 3’s 121 million), and the ultra low-budget Dad Where are We Going enjoyed the best opening day ever for a 2D film, at 87 million RMB.

For the full week, grosses totaled 1.41 billion RMB, 81 percent higher than last year’s prior New Year’s record. According to Rentrak, Monkey King and Dad ranked #1 and #2 at the worldwide box office during their opening weekend. Almost every day of the week notched a new high water mark in Chinese movie history.New Chinese Box Office Records

Over the first 6 weeks of 2013, Mainland receipts are now a sizzling 70 percent ahead of the same period in 2013, a rate of growth nearly 10 times faster than China’s GDP growth. Right now China’s movie industry is one of the world’s most dynamic businesses.Box office for week ending Feb 9, 2014

In addition to Monkey King and Dad Where Are We Going, other bright spots of the year so far include Despicable Me 2’s very respectable $53 million gross despite a 7 month release delay; The Boonie Bears’ impressive performance as China’s highest-grossing domestically made animated feature ever with a $40+ million tally; and Man From Macau’s extraordinary run, the PRC’s leggiest in recent memory.Macau's leggy run

Dad, Where Are We Going also merits special mention because it is such a surprise hit. Inspired by the popular Chinese reality TV series, which is in turn a format licensed from the hit South Korean TV show, the film is said to have shot for just 5 days in the beginning of December, 2013, with a budget of less than $1 million. Fewer than 8 weeks later it arrived on thousands of Chinese movie screens, to generally poor reviews and word-of-mouth. But never mind all that; in less than two weeks the movie has gone on to become one of China’s biggest grossing films ever.

The big grosses should keep rolling as a raft of new films hit the theaters on Valentine’s Day, including Beijing Love Story, which got off to a solid start in box office pre-sales. Given the tough comps set last week, Valentine’s Day 2014 may not set a new all-time record, but it’s likely that it will come close.

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.

‘Tiny Times,’ Gargantuan Grosses

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by Robert Cain for China Film Biz

July 4, 2013

Happy 4th of July everyone, it’s America’s Independence Day. As a person who enjoys the uninfringed right to express my thoughts to readers around the world, I’m extremely grateful for the precious freedom America’s founders fought for and bequeathed to their descendants.

On another note, I’m dedicating this post to Dominic Ng, Bennett Pozil, and their superb team at East West Bank. They recently hosted me at two of their events and made invaluable introductions for me to their clients. Dominic was kind enough to publicly recognize my work in a room full of heavy hitters at his “U.S.-China Economic Relations“ summit at the Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. And since Bennett has been after me to keep writing this blog, pleading that in its absence he’s been forced to read trade papers like the Hollywood something-or-other and another thing whose name I forget that starts with the letter “V”, I suppose anyone who gets some use out of this humble publication should thank Bennett for his persistent cajoling.

It has been an eventful month or so since I last wrote about China’s film biz. In recent weeks Iron Man 3 finished its run at $121 million, edging out local romantic drama So Young to become the second highest grossing film of the year so far behind Journey to the West. Dreamworks’ animated movie The Croods defied everyone’s expectations, including my own, running up a magnificent $63 million, which places it among the highest grossing animated films in Chinese history. Legendary East announced a partnership with China Film Group; local film American Dreams in China ran up an $86 million gross; Man of Steel opened on 6,500 screens, the biggest launch to date in China; and Paramount’s World War Z was barred by the censors, despite the producers having made pre-emptive changes to avoid offending them.

Also, the July release schedule was announced, and with four big Hollywood titles opening (After Earth, White House Down, Fast and Furious 6, and Pacific Rim) the U.S. studios might finally get a chance to make up some ground against their Chinese competitors. Finally, the release schedule for December 2013 has been set, and it looks to be a blockbuster holiday, with Tiny Times 1.5, Jackie Chan’s Police Story 2013, mega-director Feng Xiaogang’s Personal Tailor, and possibly Overheard 3 and the star-studded Monkey King (with Donnie Yen, Chow Yun-fat and Aaron Kwok) all set to open within a two-week period. My Chinese correspondent Firedeep predicts that four of these five films will wind up out-grossing Iron Man 3.

Which brings us up to the present. China’s exhibitors and producers are enjoying another stellar year so far, with almost $1.7 billion in grosses in the first half, nearly 40 percent ahead of the first half of 2012. Given the patterns of prior years, I expect a $3.7 billion final tally for the year. It’s worth noting that China is now routinely grossing more each month than it did in the entire year of 2006. At the current rate of growth the PRC market will surpass North America as the world’s largest territory in 2017, and even if growth slows considerably the succession will take place in 2018 or 2019 at the latest.

The week ending June 30th was the third biggest so far this year, at $87.5 million. Tiny Times set new records for the opening day of a local film at $12.4 million, and went even wider than Man of Steel, running on nearly 50 percent of China’s 15,000+ screens. Look for the teen female oriented Tiny Times to wind up at around $100 million when its run ends.Box office week ending 6-30-13

Man of Steel continued strong, with $21.1 million in its second week. Heavy competition from Tiny Times will curtail its grosses, and it will likely finish in the $55 million to $60 million range, which is where many recent U.S. blockbusters have settled.

Star Trek Into Darkness finished up its run right in that same range, with $57 million. To the surprise of many observers Star Trek outperformed in China, earning a healthy 13 percent of its worldwide gross in the PRC. Compare this to, say, Skyfall, Oz the Great and Powerful, and The Hobbit, each of which earned only 5 percent of their respective worldwide totals in China.

In the coming days I’ll write more about China’s first half results and the U.S. studios’  performance. Until then, happy independence day!

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.