Moving on from Chinese movies

 

It set up a joint venture in Hong Kong to launch the special administrative region's first Mandarin movie channel in February in what Wang hopes will be a Chinese version of HBO that will eventually cover the whole world.

In May, the company entered the premium fashion industry in association with Septwolves, a menswear firm in Fujian province, by staging an haute couture fashion show.

It is also the second-largest stockholder in Ourpalm Co Ltd, a mobile terminal game producer that was listed on the A-share market in May, showing a steady performance so far.

Where to go?

No matter how diversified the business becomes, Wang insisted he will always regard movies as a very important constituent of the company.

The market has changed a lot compared with five or six years ago when Huayi Brothers was the only movie producer that attracted local audiences to the cinema. Competition from within and outside the country has created a tough environment.

The announcement that China will expand the number of imported films was made after a meeting in Los Angeles between Vice-President Xi Jinping and US Vice-President Joe Biden in February.

China agreed to import 14 US films in 3D or IMAX formats every year in addition to the current quota of 20 revenue-sharing foreign films.

"The competition is more cutthroat than ever. Every month this year, Chinese movies have competed with three to four Hollywood productions," Wang said.

Box office receipts for domestic films in the first half of this year garnered only a little more than 10 percent in market share.

Since Chinese movies became fully commercialized in 2005, attendances at domestic movies have generally stood at around 55 percent compared with foreign films.

From that figure to a little more than 10 percent this year, is something of a collapse. "The major reason, of course, is the opening up of imported US movies," Wang said.

"No one could compete with the huge 3D Titanic this spring but that doesn't mean we don't have any market margin." he added.

Having just visited South Korea, Wang likes to compare the movie market in China with the one there.

South Korean people visit the cinema on average twice a year, while the number in Chinese cities is once every two years. "The huge gap means the market has potential," he said.

Wang discovered that South Korea's movie industry was also affected after it lifted its limit on imported movies in 1986 but it soon recovered. This year, South Korean movies account for about 60 percent of box office receipts, the same as before 1986.

Wang said he believes Chinese movies will have a brighter autumn or winter this year because almost all big productions will be unveiled in the second half. They include 1942, a huge production in the making for more than 10 years. It was directed by Feng Xiaogang, the most popular director in China.