China Box Office Surges by Annual 83% in 2023 to $7.73 Billion

So, here we are in mid-January, and though we’re staring down the barrel of a tough year ahead, it’s not all wintry doom and gloom on an international box office (and combined global) level. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief First-time mainland Chinese director Lin Jianjie (aka JJ Lin) makes a splash this weekend with the premiere of his “Brief History of a Family.” Asking questions about family in the era since the end of China’s ‘One Child Policy,’ while also borrowing genre tropes such as the idea of the intruder and blood, it is a polished and ultra-modern fable that sees a teenage schoolboy ingratiate himself into another boy’s family.Variety spoke to biologist-turned-filmmaker Lin on the eve of his Sundance debut.How did you get from zero to making your first feature?[After graduating in biology] I did two short films at film school. I went to Tisch Asia, which had a campus in Singapore. We also had an exchange program with Tisch in New York.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Leading Asian film directors including Josh Kim, Fukada Koji and Patiparn Boontarig line up to pitch their in-development projects at the March edition of the Hong Kong – Asia Film Financing Forum (HAF). Leading directors Wang Xiaoshuai and Zhang Lu will also be on the ground at HAF, operating as producers. So too will established producers Yamamoto Teruhisa (“Drive My Car”) and Michael J.

French cinema saw its fortunes rise at the international box office in 2023 after three difficult Covid-19 and post pandemic years, according to the annual report of export agency Unifrance released on Tuesday.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Fish out of water comedy film “Jonny Keep Walking” kept its place at the top of the mainland China box office in its third week of release. Two newcomers broke into the top five, comedy “Follow Bear for Action” and imported action title “The Beekeeper.” “Jonny,” in which a man from the countryside struggles to hold down a corporate job in a big city, earned $19.7 million (140 million), according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. That was another strong hold after an opening weekend of $26.1 million (on Dec.

Refresh for latest…: Warner Bros/Village Roadshow/Heyday Films’ Wonka continues its sweet run, crossing the $500M mark globally this weekend. The worldwide cume through Sunday is $505.3M including $329.1M from the international box office and with Korea, which has a fondness for Hollywood musicals, still to release at the end of the month.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Hamaguchi Ryusuke’s “Evil Does Not Exist” and Korean blockbuster “12.12: The Day” dominated the nominations for the 17th edition of the Asian Film Awards. Both picked up six nominations, including those in the best film category. The nominations were announced on Friday afternoon in Hong Kong, ahead of a ceremony on March 10, that will return to the city’s West Kowloon Cultural District and the Qiyu Centre.

Globally, including most everywhere overseas, 2023 box office was led by a mix of Barbie, The Super Mario Bros. Movie and Oppenheimer, curious bedfellows who nevertheless proved that cultural phenomena can come in different forms and set turnstiles spinning.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Once banned in China, Stephen King’s “The Shawshank Redemption” had its much-anticipated debut as a stage play in the country’s tech capital Shenzhen on Jan. 4. Adding to its unusual status, the play is performed in Chinese by a cast of Western actors who are based in the Middle Kingdom.

Audiences didn’t have a lot of new choices, nor a mega late-December blockbuster to ring in the first weekend of the new year at the movies, but the studio titles on offer are still drawing crowds and seeing strong holds, particularly with ongoing holidays in many international box office markets. Milestones are also being set as Warner Bros/Village Roadshow/Heyday Films’ Wonka topped $300M overseas while Disney’s Wish crossed $200M worldwide and AMC touted a new benchmark for Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Fish out of water comedy film “Jonny Keep Walking” climbed to the top of the mainland China box office in its second weekend on release. Previous winner, “Shining for One Thing” dimmed quickly and tumbled to fifth place. The first weekend of the new year and following a welter of Christmas-New Year releases, the latest weekend represented a reordering of holdover titles, rather than a session with an injection of significant fresh movies. “Jonny,” in which a man from the countryside struggles to hold down a corporate job in a big city, earned $22.4 million (RMB159 million) from Friday to Sunday, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “I don’t find the definition of Chinese filmmakers by generation to be a useful tool,” said Marco Mueller, introducing dark satire “The Movie Emperor” as the opening film of the first edition of his Festival of Young Cinema (Asia-Europe) in Macau on Friday. “Much more interesting is the concept of exchange between new and old and between East and West.” “The new forces of Chinese cinema are present and participating.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese director Huo Meng, Taiwanese actor Lee Hong-chi and Macau-based Maxim Bessmertny are among a dozen emerging East Asian talent who will present feature film projects and works in progress at the Festival of Young Cinema (Asia-Europe). The inaugural edition of the festival, running Jan.

Global box office is estimated to have reached $33.9B for 2023, a 30.5% gain on 2022, according to Gower Street Analytics. While this represents continuing worldwide recovery, the figure remains 15% behind the average of the last three pre-pandemic years (2017-2019). Gower Street also recently estimated that, due in part to this year’s strike-impacted release calendar, 2024 is projected to drop to $31.5 billion, which, given today’s revised estimate for last year, would come in at 7% below 2023. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Hong Kong saw “A Guilty Conscience” become the highest-grossing film of all time at its local box office. But the wider cinema market in Hong Kong remained stuck far below pre-pandemic levels. Data from Hong Kong Box Office Limited, a joint venture between Motion Picture Industry Association (MPIA) and the Hong Kong Theatres Association, showed annual cinema revenue of HK$1.43 billion ($184 million) in 2023. That was a 25% improvement on 2022, when the industry was battered by on-off closures due to government COVID-control measures, and managed only HK$1.14 billion ($146 million).

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Asia’s video industry is set to grow by an annual 2.6% over the next five years to reach $165 billion by 2028, says a new study from research and consultancy firm Media Partners Asia. That follows 5.5% growth in 2023. The firm’s “Asia Pacific Video & Broadband Industry 2024” report spans a widely-defined cluster of free TV, pay-TV, SVOD, premium AVOD and user-generated content and social video in 14 Asia-Pacific countries and territories.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent The French box office jumped 19% in 2023 with an estimated €1.3 billion ($1.4 billion) grossed from 181.2 million tickets, according to Comscore France. Unlike in 2022, when the top 10 was exclusively dominated by U.S.

Brent Lang Executive Editor “Wonka,” a musical fantasy that has been the biggest hit of the holiday season, topped the box office on New Year’s Eve, closing 2023 on a sweet note. The film, which stars Timothée Chalamet as a more youthful Willy Wonka, grossed $22.7 million for the weekend and a projected $29.5 million for the four-day holiday. That brings the domestic gross to $140.2 million, a strong result for the $125 million production.

MONDAY AM writethru: Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus, and he’s delivering the motion picture industry a $9 billion-plus year at the domestic box office, a feat many thought was unimaginable with the lack of a mega-tentpole over the holiday, coupled by a Q4 impacted by the double strikes. The numbers were compiled from Comscore data and Deadline calculations. Comscore called 2023 at $9.03 billion yesterday.

Ridley Scott’s Napoleon has crossed the $200M mark globally, getting to the milestone with Tuesday’s numbers included. The worldwide tally for the biographical epic is $200.7M, of which $141.1M is from the international box office. Through yesterday, the domestic cume is $59.6M.