|
 Stars like Nicole Kidman and John Travolta were on hand as the
company's chairman, Wang Jianlin, boldly announced that the new
studio in the east coast city of Qingdao would help make China a
"global cultural powerhouse".
Five years later, the Oriental Movie Metropolis is set to open
its doors but the mutual courtship between China and Hollywood
is looking less rosy.
Walking the red carpet at the Qingdao studio launch Saturday
will be Chinese comic actor Huang Bo – a big name locally –
while Hollywood A-listers are expected to stay away.
Wang's own ambitions are also looking more modest. Wanda last
year sold its interest in the studio to a Chinese rival,
maintaining just a management role in the venture, whose
fortunes look increasingly unclear as the American film industry
sours on China.
A handful of U.S.-China film ventures have fallen apart over
cultural clashes, financing deals have collapsed, and
Hollywood's share of the local market has lost ground to a surge
of popular, and often patriotic-minded, local film productions.
A trade war between Beijing and Washington is also looming.
Negotiations over improved market access for U.S. producers via
China's strict quota system and a larger slice of profits have
stalled, according to industry insiders. Reports earlier this
year had suggested China was ready to open up the market.
"Everybody is waiting to see, but I don't think the quota on
imported movies will be lifted," said Zhang Haoyue, a Hollywood
studio sales executive who previously worked as an import
manager for China Film Group, the state-backed film giant.
SLATE DEALS
A series of high-profile deals and financing agreements have
also hit snags.
Wang, the Wanda chairman, last year saw his $1 billion bid for
the U.S. company Dick Clark Productions Inc fall though after
its owner, Eldridge Industries, said the Chinese company failed
to honor contractual obligations.
Wang controls the U.S. cinema chain AMC Entertainment Holdings
Inc and Legendary Entertainment, a U.S. studio.
China's Huahua Media and the state-backed Shanghai Film Group in
November scrapped a $1 billion agreement to co-finance a slate
of films from Paramount Pictures. In February, NBCUniversal sold
out of Oriental DreamWorks, its much-hyped joint venture between
China Media Capital and Universal's DreamWorks Animation.
Industry sources said Huahua had encountered liquidity problems
amid a Chinese crackdown on "irrational" overseas deals and its
domestic partners had also pulled out of the deal.
"For a while everybody was going to China," thinking that
Chinese investors just wanted to "meet celebrities, be exposed
to Hollywood," said Ben Waisbren, a U.S. film producer and
president of LSC Film Corp.
Waisbren said Hollywood had looked to Chinese investors to
offload some financing risk, but many realized making a return
in film wasn't so easy.
"Somebody in China said, 'these deals don't make any sense ...
and we don't want to look stupid because we don't want Hollywood
to look at us as dumb money,'" said Waisbren.
Wanda sold off the Qingdao studio to a rival property developer,
Sunac China Holdings Ltd, amid a sweeping sell-down of assets to
raise funds. Wanda retains management control of the complex.
[to top of second column] |
TINSELTOWN
China is also tightening its grip on its film market. A recent
regulatory reshuffle handed control over censorship and
approvals to the Communist Party's powerful publicity department
last month.
China's quota system allows 34 imported movies, while overseas
producers get a 25 percent share of box office takings - less
than in other international markets. Since 2016 a handful more
have been allowed in via a "cultural exchange" channel.
U.S. film industry insiders said that Chinese regulators were
increasingly protecting local films and saving the best release
dates around holidays for local movies.
Foreign producers and distributors would also sometimes get
approvals shortly before release dates, limiting the time for
marketing.
"I don't think the Communist Party and Chinese government are
interested in having more American content in China," said
Robert Cain, president of Pacific Bridge Pictures, which
provides financial and strategic services to the film industry.
"I don't think the U.S. has very much bargaining leverage right
now."
BOX OFFICE
Hollywood blockbusters once ruled in China, but are losing
steam. North American movies have taken around a quarter of the
box office in China so far this year, down from over 45 percent
in 2016, according to data from the box office tracker EntGroup.
This shift could hit Wanda's Qingdao studio, which had hoped to
benefit from soaring demand from overseas producers looking to
add China elements to their films to help boost box office
takings in China.
Last year, a movie about a Chinese hero beating western
mercenaries in Africa broke China's box-office record, while
Hollywood offerings like "Star Wars: The Last Jedi" failed to
ignite when released in China earlier this year.
Hollywood films that focus on action figures or superheroes no
longer provide a magic formula in China, said Kevin Niu, a
U.S.-based producer who worked on the horror movie "Abattoir".
"Chinese audiences seem to enjoy content that has strong family
and community value, or content that depicts themselves or their
dream life-style," he said.
With the aid of Hollywood know-how and bigger budgets, local
movies, once ridiculed for weak special effects and storylines,
are gaining momentum as they find ways to play on these domestic
themes and improve production quality.
"Made in China might not be entirely respected, but it's getting
better every month," said Chris Bremble, chief executive of Base
FX, a China-based visual effects and animation company.
Bremble said Chinese cinemagoers were willing to splash out on
tickets for domestic films now because they look increasingly
like big international movies.
"Chinese cinema will soon be looking more like Hollywood cinema,
which is spectacle driven, very commercial focused motion
pictures," he said.
(Reporting by Pei Li in QINGDAO and Adam Jourdan in SHANGHAI;
Editing by Philip McClellan)
[© 2018 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2018 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content. |
