Bob Violence

It's really one long movie cut into two parts. Even if the first one had bombed in China, martial-arts movies are about the only kind of Chinese-language films that get significant international distribution, so they'd still make money by selling it to foreign distributors as two films instead of one (which is exactly what they did). A rough parallel might be the Weinsteins' late decision to break Grindhouse into two features for distribution outside North America, which probably allowed it to bring in more money than it would've as a double feature (the double-feature version bombed in the U.S.). As for Taichi, your instinct is correct -- the first part is mediocre but the second part is just bad. The pacing is horrible (there's like a forty-minute stretch where nothing happens) and they mostly abandon the questionable attempts at humor (which at least had a certain energy to them), replacing them with, well, nothing. The other side of that coin is there's much less of the "wacky" superimposed text and graphics from the first film, but my big problem there was that the superimpositions tended to distract from the action, whereas the second film has almost no action worth speaking of. My hunch (I'm too lazy to check) is that the decision to split the film into two parts was taken at a late stage, which might explain why the second part is so much draggier. All in all, they could've cut it down to a single two-hour feature without losing anything worthwhile.

They went one film over the quota (21 revenue-sharing films instead of 20) in 2005. Not sure if that was the only time, though in 2008 they began exempting 3D films from the quota, which was essentially the predecessor to the current 14-film expanded quota.

It could be a swipe and still be authentic. Some of the early promotional art for Donnie Yen's upcoming Monkey King movie was ripped off from some computer game. That said, the logos at the bottom don't correspond to what's known about the film so far -- there's no mention of Chinavision or Wanda (the two main producers) and I've seen nothing about Universal being involved -- so it's almost certainly a fanmade fake. But there's no question that they're making a new Police Story. They've been kicking it around for awhile, and Jackie said on his blog last week that it starts shooting on November 15th. Edit: I shoulda just googled "Kung Fu Tube" -- that took me to this Japanese fansite, which has that very poster on their front page, along with stuff like The Expendables 3 and "The Jackiexpendables." They even have another Police Story 2013 poster with Maggie Cheung, which is wishful thinking to put it lightly.

The U.S. BD/DVD came out in mid-September. I didn't see for myself, but I have no problem believing Chinese bootlegs were already in circulation by the time it opened. I think the 3D really helped in this case -- from my observations, 3D remains more of a selling point in China than in the U.S., and the fact that earlier 3D shlock-horror like Piranha 3D didn't play in Chinese theaters (for obvious reasons) gives Bait more novelty value. But there's no novelty if you just watch it as a DVD or an RMVB download.

What makes it really dodgy here is that it's happening almost immediately after Looper was denied full co-production status at practically the last minute, ostensibly because it wasn't Chinese enough. Looper still got perks a normal import wouldn't have received -- mainly the Golden Week release date -- but it received a normal import certificate and China Film Group still served as the distribution authority (there is no CFG credit on Bait 3D). So a film that nobody regarded as a Chinese co-production until now apparently receives special treatment denied to a film with genuine and substantial Chinese production involvement. It's hard to avoid the conclusion that Bait 3D gamed the system, which is impressive for what's basically a direct-to-video-caliber film (and was in fact a direct-to-video film in the U.S.).

As I mentioned a few pages earlier, Bait 3D seems to have obtained some relatively unusual status from SARFT. The certificate didn't show the usual "电审进字," and in fact it was a type I don't recall ever seeing before. Unfortunately I couldn't catch exactly what it was, though I think it had the character "乙" in it somewhere. I assume it's some sort of co-production status. Entgroup actually has it listed as a "China/Australia" production, which is interesting, since most English-language sources have it as an Australian-Singaporean production with no mention of Chinese involvement.

Even the most awful domestic horror films are guaranteed at least a few million bucks, which doesn't sound impressive, but then they obviously put next to no money into their production. A trashy, relatively gory foreign horror film (though I don't think the SARFT certificate identified it as an import -- did it get full co-production status?), in 3D, with decent production values (the shark looks a bit better than your typical Syfy movie and they probably spent more on the set than local horror films do on the entire production)...that's a pretty good bet if released at the right time. And since this is basically a weekend for burnoffs, there's not exactly heavy competition, even if ten new openers looks intimidating on paper.

The first chart: 1. Expendables 2 2. Prometheus 3. TDKR 4. TASM 5. The Bullet Vanishes 6. The Expendables 1 (reissue) 7. The Lion Roars 2 8. Holding Love 9. Let It Be 10. Horrible Hotel Chart 2 is the same up through #4, then: 5. White Deer Plain 6. Tad, the Lost Explorer (Spain) 7. Sad Fairy Tale 8. The Bullet Vanishes 9. Let It Be 10. The Lion Roars 2 The first column of numbers is total admissions, the second is the weekly gross, the third is the total domestic gross. All numbers are divided by 10,000.

Yes, that goes without saying. It's also probably ages away, unfortunately. Maybe within a decade or two they'll loosen up to the level of, say, Singapore; I can't say I have higher hopes than that. The obvious first step would be a rating system, but they've been dragging their feet on that for years, leading to the ridiculous hypocrisy of pretending that something like Expendables 2 or Dangerous Liaisons is as much an "all ages" film as Sammy's Adventure.

I dunno, maybe I'm misremembering, but I recall plenty of bullet impacts with visible blood, and within the first five minutes someone fires a truck-mounted machine gun and the target's head blows up. (That brought a big "ohhhhhhh" from the opening-night crowd.) Expendables 1 was heavily cut, but that was two years ago and the censors' standards are hardly that rigid. There was stuff cut out of The Grey and Seediq Bale earlier this year that was less violent than what you could see in Expendables 2. It could well just be a matter of pulling the right strings.

Lots of blood in the Chinese version of RE4. Even more in Expendables 2, which had actual human characters (not just zombies) getting bloodily mowed down and even blown apart. Even if it was cut (I haven't seen any other version to compare), it was still hard-R material. RE5 will probably have some cuts but I doubt it'll be butchered. The censors seem to be accommodating themselves to a certain level of gore, at least in foreign films. Of course I don't expect to see lingering, graphic disembowellings anytime soon.

The first one did over $30 million in China. That didn't smash records, but it was just enough to put it in that year's top 10, and China was its second-biggest market behind the U.S. There's a reason the producers tried to set the sequel up as a full co-production -- which didn't work out, but as firedeep noted, it was still a co-production. Even if it wasn't, China loves franchises as much as anyone else (just look at page one if you don't believe me), and I'm sure it would've come out anyway. If Taken 2 can come out in China with no Chinese production involvement, I see no reason The Expendables 2 couldn't have done the same.

The only relevant portion is the third paragraph. Here's a rough translation: Five heroes battling for the throne [referring to this week's five new openers] have made this year's National Day more crowded than ever. [While] copies of the film could not be completely rolled out for various reasons, Looper still surged in attendance, driving a clear box-office rise. In just three days its box office reached nearly 30 million, [leaving] no suspense in its climb to the top rank of the box office. No denomination is ever specified, but the Chinese media is hardly in the habit of using U.S. dollars to report local box-office numbers. As for the press release, the quote comes from Endgame, not Sony, which makes more sense. Endgame co-produced the movie and would have every reason to boast about such a record, but they also weren't involved on the Chinese side (that was DMG), so they would be more prone to such a mistake. Or they're just being devious and using a ten-day projection without saying so, as some here have suggested. But I agree with the others that a dollars-for-yuan error is the real explanation.

Here is a "legitimate" Chinese news source providing a rough estimate of 30 million yuan (US$4.8m) for the three-day weekend, which is close enough to the 27m yuan figure from firedeep's source.

But from who? Was it a tracking service or an outfit actually associated with the film?

I doubt it. Sony and Film District (the U.S. distributors) wouldn't be trumpeting the bogus Chinese numbers, since they have nothing to do with it in China. Why brag about a foreign distributor making more money off of a movie than you did? Maybe DMG, but then DMG almost certainly has the actual Chinese figures, and I can't imagine why they'd shoot themselves in the foot by raising expectations to such unrealistic levels. And if you don't believe that entertainment journalists would blindly take their cues from Finke, even UK newspapers are citing her.

No offense, baumer -- I appreciate what you're trying to do -- but maybe you should try to do something about the front page of this very site?

AFAIK the "record" talk is coming exclusively from Nikki Finke, and while it's not clear where she got her numbers from, I'm betting somebody somewhere mistook a 25 million RMB weekend projection for 25 million USD. If they're making a U.S. dollar projection for the entire week, I'd love to know how they're so confident as to make such a prediction within a $2m range. Anyway, suffice to say the U.S. opening weekend (around $20 mil, give or take a couple) will comfortably blow away the Chinese opening weekend. The opening week numbers might come out in China's favor, but then again, so what? It's not like the U.S. is having a weeklong holiday too. As for The Expendables 2, direct comparisons are iffy because it opened on a Tuesday in China, but if you compare its first six days in China to its first six days in the U.S. -- which includes its entire first weekend in both markets -- you end up with about $25 million versus $37 million. Titanic 3D (which opened on a Tuesday in China and a Wednesday in the U.S.) did way, way better on its first six days in China ($74m versus $28m), but I suppose you could argue it "doesn't count" because it was a reissue. Or maybe neither film counts because they weren't day-and-date releases in China. But the basic issue here is that Finke and her "source" just don't know what they're talking about.

Taken 2 comes out on the 7th, on the last day of the holiday. Not actually a Hollywood movie, but nobody really makes that distinction and there's probably a fair overlap between its audience and Looper's. It's not just violence. The international version also has more in the strip club (including nudity), a scene with Gordon-Levitt in bed with two women, and more about his drug habit (which is reduced to a single allusion in the Chinese version). The movie is an R in the U.S. so it's not surprising it got cut in China. On an anecdotal note, the theater where I saw it was about 1/5 full at 2:30 PM on a Saturday, and there was no line for tickets. Granted, a lot of people are traveling today, but still...

Might mention that the Chinese version of The Woman in Black was censored -- the ending was cut short to remove I think they also made cuts to the scene where but I'm not certain about that. Ghosts and reincarnation are a touchy subject for the censors (since they're "feudal superstitions"), but the entire movie is basically about a ghost, so I'm not sure what the rationale was for these particular cuts. I guess they don't want people to think that dying is an effective method for getting reunited with loved ones?

firedeep is right that non-English foreign movies are usually dubbed, but the 2011 Detective Conan movie (Quarter of Silence) was released in both subtitled and dubbed versions, and the Japanese import before that (Norwegian Wood) didn't have a dubbed version at all. But Japanese films are so infrequently released in China that it's hard to say whether this was the start of a trend or just a brief experiment. (The only one released in 2012 to date was an Ultraman movie pitched squarely to kids, so it was only shown in a dubbed version.) It makes a certain amount of sense to offer Japanese movies in their original language, since Japanese is the second-most-studied foreign language in China. And if it is a trend, I hope it eventually extends to other languages. I'd like to go to a Chinese cinema and see a Korean film in Korean for once.

Both of those posts you linked to are in a private group, so I can't read them. And frankly releasing a version of the film that didn't go through SARFT sounds like a kamikaze move -- it's not like they aren't going to find out eventually. Given that it's apparently possible in China to create and distribute a new DCP within a few days, it doesn't seem implausible that they rushed the first one and didn't notice the subtitle problem until it was too late.

Strange developments: White Deer Plain was delayed because of a fault with the digital master -- apparently the subtitles were unreadable. The premiere is still set for today, but the general release has been postponed. The revised master has supposedly been completed and may be in theaters by Sunday, which would still give the holdovers most of the weekend to themselves. It could well miss the weekend entirely. The latest Detective Conan movie (originally scheduled for the 25th) and the local film The Tree in the Rain (previously set for the 19th) have also reportedly been bumped out of September. There's still a few small titles coming out next week -- The Woman in Black, a couple of undistinguished-looking domestic films -- but the field will be slightly more open until the end of the month, when the big National Day releases hit.

Well, they do now, probably because of how young and urban the typical audience has become. That certainly wasn't always the case. Just five years ago it was almost impossible to find subtitled prints in this city. Go back far enough and the same was true even in Beijing and Shanghai. Supposedly dubbed versions are still popular in more rural areas, but I don't get out of the city much, so I can't attest to that.

All four of the recent Hollywood imports have Mandarin versions showing here (Qingdao) alongside the English ones. Only a couple of theaters have the Mandarin versions, so you'd have to go out of your way to see them. I don't know why they bother.