DAILY BRIEF: Mar 14, 2019

NEWS YOU SHOULDN’T MISS

• 1

  ‘The Wandering Earth’ Is Leading the Sci-Fi Charge at China’s Box Office

  Whether these blockbusters can blast off beyond China remains in doubt, however. Insiders say their popularity is more a sign of China’s growing cultural confidence than proof of a work of international quality and potential. Variety

• 2

  Mnuchin Faces Ethics Questions Over Ties to Film Industry

  As Treasury secretary and one of the lead negotiators in trade talks with China, Mr. Mnuchin has been personally pushing Beijing to give the American film industry greater access to its markets — a change that could be highly lucrative to his former industry. The New York Times

• 3

  India’s Newest Internet Users Are Addicted to These Apps From China

  Some of China’s quirkiest social-media firms are signing up hundreds of millions of consumers in India, tech’s biggest untapped market. The Wall Street Journal

• 4

  Young Chinese directors evade censors to give voice to ethnic minorities in child-focused films

  In movies that examine the lives of children from different ethnic minorities and social classes, China’s up-and-coming filmmakers may have found a way to tackle topics that would otherwise be no-go zones. South China Morning Post

• 5

  Hong Kong's Filmart to put a sharper focus on TV and streaming this year

  It’s a sign of the shifting sands in the global content industry when the largest film-trading platform in Asia starts talking up its connections to the worlds of TV and streaming. But that is certainly the case with this year’s edition of the Hong Kong International Film and TV Market (Filmart, March 18-21). Screen Daily