Hollywood looks east

A scene from the Sino-US co-produced film Say Yes!. Provided to China Daily

Journey to the West

Written, produced and directed by famed Hong Kong director Stephen Chow, Journey to the West was jointly financed and co-produced by Chow's Hong Kong based company Bingo Movie Development, Village Roadshow Pictures Asia, the Greater China division of Los Angeles-based Village Roadshow Entertainment Group, Edko Films of Hong Kong and China Vision Media Group of Hong Kong. Huayi Brothers Media Group was the film's co-production partner and distributor on the Chinese mainland.

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"Our VRPA team vetted the project concept, provided funding and advised on investment and distribution arrangements," says Ellen Eliasoph, president and CEO of VRPA. "We also assisted with marketing and publicity for the film, and, through our affiliated companies, are handling its marketing and distribution in Singapore, Australia and New Zealand."

Eliasoph, a graduate of Yale University and Yale Law School who speaks fluent Mandarin, became the first Hollywood executive based in China when she established Warner Bros' Beijing office in 1993, importing The Fugitive to China as the first Hollywood revenue-sharing film.

VRPA's second release, Say Yes!, a Chinese-language remake of the hit 1991 Fuji Television drama 101st Marriage Proposal, opened on Feb 12, 2013, and set a new China record for a romance film screening on Valentine's Day, earning 47 million yuan. The movie was jointly financed and co-produced by VRPA, New Classics Media, Fuji Television Network and Asia Times Cultural Media.

With the success of its two film releases in the same week, VRPA captured the lion's share of the Chinese New Year holiday box office, peaking at 85 percent on Valentine's Day, and becoming the first foreign co-producer to have the No 1 and No 2 films at China's box office at the same time.

Eager to gain access to Chinese consumers, some of Hollywood's biggest names - including DreamWorks Animations and 20th Century Fox parent News Corp - are making deals with local partners.

DreamWorks announced a joint venture last year with three government-backed companies in China: China Media Capital, Shanghai Alliance Investment and Shanghai Media Group (SMG).

The joint venture will make Shanghai's western bank of the Huangpu River a new cultural district with theaters, clubs and a studio that will be the home of Oriental DreamWorks, where co-production movies will be produced.

In May 2012, News Corp acquired a 19.9 percent stake in Beijing-based Bona Film Group, after Bona's 2011 3D release Flying Swords of Dragon Gate took in $68.9 million in China, ranking ahead of Harry Potter and the Deathly Harrows (Part 2) that year.

Fox teamed up with Huayi Brothers, China's leading non-State sector film group, for several films, including the 2011 release Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, which was co-produced in China by Wendi Deng, the China-born wife of Rupert Murdoch, founder, chairman and CEO of News Corp.

While some Hollywood studios are doing co-productions, the film industry also saw Wanda, China's largest enterprise investor, spend $2.6 billion in 2012 to acquire AMC theaters in the US. The new ownership means US audiences will have more chances to see movies made by Chinese producers in AMC theaters.

While involved in co-productions, Chinese producers and directors are also seeking Hollywood's help to duplicate the success of big-budget US films.

Lost in Thailand, a low-budget slapstick comedy, became China's highest-grossing domestically produced movie in December, drawing 32 million people to theaters.

Its US opening-week box office gross in February 2013 was only $57,397, according to IMDB, the Internet Movie Database of information on films, television programs and video games.

Stanley Rosen, director of the East Asian Studies Center at the University of Southern California, says subtitled films don't do well in the US. They make up about 1 percent of the market and are seen as "art" films by distributors.

"They can't compete for screen time at the multiplexes with the 'big films'. Films like these won't have much of a budget for prints, advertising and marketing," says Clayton Dube, president of USC's US-China Institute.

Ang Lee

Among a handful of Chinese movies that have been successful in the US was Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which made $128 million. Another is Zhang Yimou's Hero at $55 million, Rosen says.

Yang, who grew up on New York's Long Island and studied Asian studies and Mandarin at Brown University, says being bilingual and bicultural help her understand the US and Chinese markets as a movie producer.

"Some Chinese directors want to make international movies, but they have not spent enough time abroad," she says.

"It's about sensibility. It takes an international person to make an international movie."

Contact the writer at kellyzhang@chinadailyusa.com.