A Look at Chinese Capital Behind the Oscar Nominees
After the film Green Book was nominated for the Best Picture Award by the 91st Academy Awards, its Chinese co-producer Alibaba Pictures received lots of attention in China. However, Alibaba Pictures is not the first Chinese company that involved in Oscar-nominated films. Back in 2016, Spotlight, which was distributed by AMC’s Open Road Films, won Best Picture at the Oscars. China’s Wanda, the parent company of AMC, then became one of the first Chinese companies financed an Oscar-winning film. A more straightforward case is Alpha Group Co., Ltd., a Chinese animation and toy company that co-financed three films produced by New Regency Productions. Among them, The Revenant won three Academy Awards that year. More examples included La La Land (Hunan TV & Broadcast), Kong: Skull Island (Huayi Brothers, Legendary, and Tencent Pictures), All the Money in the World (Enlight Media), Molly’s Game (Huayi Brothers), Phantom Threads (Perfect World Pictures), and Darkest Hour (Perfect World Pictures). In 2019, Chinese film market sees a lot of potential in high-quality content. Besides Green Book, two Oscar-nominated films have been acquired by Chinese companies for China releases: the Lebanese film Capernaum is acquired by Road Pictures and Roma was bought by Beijing Joy Pictures. Read more on entgroup.cn
‘Deadpool 2’ Topped China Box Office in Its Opening Week
As of January 27th, China box office has grossed 3 billion yuan (US$ 445 million), 1.9 billion yuan less than the 4.95 billion yuan generated in January last year. At the end of January, the total box office is expected to drop by at least 1.5 billion, compared to the same period last year. Deadpool 2 topped the weekly box office with 151 million yuan (US$22.3 million). Local animation White Snake took second place, grossing 130 million yuan (US$ 19.2 million) last week and 298 million yuan (US$44.1 million) in total. Bumblebee, which came in the third place, earned 119 million yuan (US$17 million) last week. It brought the movie’ cumulative box office to 1.05 billion yuan (US$157 million), making Bumblebee the first foreign film that crossed the 1 billion yuan mark in 2019. Read more on Mtime
‘An Elephant Sitting Still‘ May Get A China Release
Arthouse film An Elephant Sitting Still may get a theatrical release in mainland China, according to Gao Yitian, producer of the film. Gao disclosed this news on the stage of the Fourth Cinephile Prize, which was held on January 26. Gao said that they had been working on the release procedure for the film.” He also encouraged the audience to wait for the theatrical release instead of watching the pirated version online. The 4-hour long film is late filmmaker Hu Bo’s feature debut. The film won Best Feature Film Award at this year’s Golden Horse Awards. Mtime
