Chinese New Year Box Office Hits $1.2B, Sets Record High Over Holiday Period

It’s been more than a decade since James Cameron’s “Avatar” arrived in cinemas and basically destroyed nearly every record along the way. For months, the film was a must-see event that drove legions of people to theaters to sport 3D glasses and watch blue aliens fight for their planet.

Chinese New Year movies continued to drive the global and international box office this weekend, after their astonishing Covid-era debuts last frame. Leaders last session, Detective Chinatown 3 and Hi Mom, both crossed the RMB 4B mark locally, with each at an estimated RMB 4.02B ($621M) cume through Sunday. This is after just 10 days of play for each film, and boosts both up the all-time charts

Rebecca Davis editorWarner Brothers’ live action-animation hybrid film “Tom and Jerry” has quietly locked in a Feb. 26 release date in China, which will make it the first foreign film to hit theaters in the wake of the Chinese New Year.The lunar new year public holiday, which this year ran from Feb.

Rebecca Davis editorThe embattled production powerhouse Beijing Culture has emerged as the biggest publicly-listed winner of the Chinese New Year box office bonanza. Its stock price has climbed 18% since the start of the holiday thanks to the success of its hit comedy “Hi Mom.”The boost is a much needed one following two years of losses and a government investigation late last year that unveiled mismanagement and inaccurate figures in its prior financial statements.

Rebecca Davis editorChina’s Lunar New Year holiday brought in a record $1.2 billion (RMB7.8 billion) in ticket sales, making a tenth of the global 2020 box office in just six days.It marked the first time in Chinese film history that the country’s single-day box office exceeded RMB1 billion ($155 million) for five consecutive days.

After acquiring Chinese New Year title The Yin Yang Master last week, Netflix is adding animated fantasy New Gods: Nezha Reborn to its roster. The film, based on the classic mythology The Romance Of The Gods, debuted theatrically in China for Lunar New Year on February 12 and grossed $21.3M through the weekend. To date, it has made over $36M in the market. Netflix has taken exclusive global streaming rights outside China.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefMovie industry shares soared in Hong Kong on Tuesday in response to the bumper revenues being earned at the mainland China box office over the Chinese New Year holidays.Leading the gains were Imax China and Alibaba Pictures, both of which have direct stakes in the box office boom. Imax China stock climbed by 31% to HK$18.36 per share at the close of trading.

Rebecca Davis editorChina made history this weekend with record sales of nearly $775 million (RMB50 billion) within the first three days of the Chinese New Year holiday, led by an incredible $424 million (RMB2.74 billion) debut from “Detective Chinatown 3.”This marked the first time the country’s national box office has ever broken RMB1 billion ($155 million) a day for three consecutive days, a feat achieved despite caps on max theater capacity at 75% in most of the country and 50% in areas

Rebecca Davis editorThe world’s largest film market is living up to its title with world-record-setting sales.

marked by a different animal.

Chinese New Year is celebrated later in the year, rather than the January 1 date observed by the Gregorian calendar.

Richard Kuipers Parallel worlds commingle with initially intriguing but progressively less invigorating results in “A Writer’s Odyssey,” a handsomely produced action-fantasy directed by Chinese hitmaker Lu Yang (“Brotherhood of Blades,” “The Sacrifice”).