Warcraft

[GeneChing]

The ‘epic’ bid

Hollywood’s epic bid to conquer China

Panned by critics and commercially disastrous in the West, Warcraft is in China’s top 10 grossing films of all time
Christopher Williams, chief business correspondent
17 SEPTEMBER 2016 • 4:50PM

As a work of cinema, Warcraft was “empty and impenetrable” and cursed with a “terminal flimsiness” that made for an “epic fail”, according to the critics. Film-goers were warned to “avoid it at all costs” this summer, and for the most part in the US and UK they did. In its opening weekend at the US box office Warcraft grossed only $24m on the back of a production budget of $160m, which under normal circumstances would easily qualify the video game adaptation as a flop.

Amid the rise of the Chinese consumer, definitions of success and failure have changed, however, and the film industry is adjusting accordingly.

Warcraft brought in $65m in its opening weekend in the People’s Republic, and has marched on to a total of more than $220m to date, making it the third-highest grossing film at the Chinese box office this year.

“Thank God for China,” says Charles 'Chuck’ Roven, the Hollywood veteran whose production company Atlas Entertainment backed Warcraft.

[QUOTE]It had one Chinese actor in it, and you couldn’t really recognise him because he was an orc
Charles ‘Chuck’ Roven

“It was really disappointing in the US, but that film now has a chance of maybe making a little and even generating a sequel as a result of what it did in that one territory.”

Warcraft’s massive success in China is emblematic of how Chinese money is changing the film industry. The growing spending power of consumers, the politics of doing business in the world’s second largest economy, and the increasingly global ambitions of Chinese investors, are all altering the how and why of making movies.

“We knew China was going to be important, but it has really started to spike,” Roven says. “Warcraft has caused a lot of people to go, 'Wow’. China is the second largest market in the world, and it has now proven to us that a western movie can work there. Warcraft was a totally western movie.

“It had one Chinese actor in it, and you couldn’t really recognise him because he was an orc. He was great in the movie though.”

Chinese movie-goers in 3-D glasses CREDIT: AFP/GETTY IMAGES

The ability of Chinese cinephiles to save a floundering Hollywood release, or even a whole franchise, is now well established. A strong appetite for computer-generated spectacle and 3D has proved the box office salvation of the 2013 giant robot action film Pacific Rim, and has helped keep the Transformers series clanking along despite audience weariness and critical loathing in the West.

But with China due to overtake the US as the world’s largest cinema market next year, success there is more than a safety net. Roven’s latest release, the superhero franchise instalment Suicide Squad, made with Warner Bros, has performed reasonably well around the world. News that it is unlikely to get a release in China as an apparent result of a dark tone that celebrates rebellion was greeted in Hollywood last month as a heavy blow to its commercial prospects.

“The Government there is so unpredictable by our standards and what Hollywood is used to,” says Stephen Follows, an independent film industry analyst. “There are very strict rules on things like time travel and magic, and anything non-scientific, but they are broken all the time.”

There are very strict rules on things like time travel and magic, and anything non-scientific, but they are broken all the time

Navigating a combination of censorship and protectionism is a major challenge for Western studios seeking access to Chinese wallets. The state monopoly importer, China Film Group (CFG), only allows 34 foreign-produced titles onto the country’s silver screens, which last year numbered more than 30,000 and next year are expected to top 50,000.

The scale of the market and the growth opportunity makes the censorship gauntlet well worth running. Even with 50,000 screens, China would need more than 10 times as many to match the UK’s number per head of population.

“There are still so many places there that don’t have cinemas,” Follows says. “All boats are rising on the tide. Studios might worry about protectionism later but right now it’s a story of raw growth.”

Chinese audiences have kept the Transformers franchise rolling

Hollywood titles accounted for 46pc of the Chinese box office in 2014, which fell to 38.4pc in 2015, as the market itself grew 48.7pc. Only three Hollywood movies were in the top 10 at he Chinese box office, down from five in 2014. But the incentives remain great enough for Western companies to go into business in China with local investors, especially since films majority backed by a Chinese-owned enterprise do not count towards CFG’s quota.

The rules on what counts as Chinese are strict and require permanent establishment in China, unlike the UK, where visiting productions can claim tax exemptions merely by hiring British staff. But in China the hassle of working internationally and blow of giving up equity are softened by a bigger slice of potentially massive box office takings. “You normally get 20pc,” Roven says. “If you have a co-production you get 44pc. That’s a huge difference no matter what.”

China’s greatest box office hits

The Mermaid (2016 – $527m)

Furious 7 (2015 – $391m)

Monster Hunt (2015 – $351m)

Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014 – $320m)

Mojin: The Lost Legend (2015 – $256m)

Warcraft has been a major beneficiary of this system. The film, a collaboration between Roven’s Atlas Entertainment and Legendary Pictures, a pioneer of Chinese co-production among Hollywood studios via a 2013 deal with CFG, was guaranteed a release.

Roven says the relationship meant the film also got valuable backing on the ground. “You want to be in business with companies that are going to help you get the best distribution, the best exhibition and best remittances,” he says.

Selling films into China still involves accepting unpredictability. Stephen Follows says data on attendances and revenues is unreliable. “If you’re being fiddled by your Chinese partner there is nothing you can really do about it,” he says.

Yet the ties are strengthening in both directions. As well as Hollywood studios setting up in China, Chinese investors have been buying Western film assets. Legendary Entertainment itself was snapped up in January for $3.5bn (£2.6bn) by Dalian Wanda, the Hong Kong-listed conglomerate controlled by Wang Jianlin, one of China’s richest men.

Wanda has also been linked this summer to a potential takeover of Paramount, one of the Big Six studios, currently owned by Viacom.[/QUOTE]
continued next post

[GeneChing]

Continued from previous post

Zachary Quinto attends a red carpet even for Star Trek Beyond in Guangzhou CREDIT: GETTY

Meanwhile, Tencent, the Chinese web giant, acquired IM Global, a US film financier. Roven envisages the deal as part of a plan by Tencent, which owns a slice of Warcraft, to create a powerful Netflix-like business in China. Such a move could deliver subscription revenues in a market where DVDs brought in nothing, because of rampant piracy.

Hunan Television, China’s number two broadcaster, has invested up to $375m in productions by Lions Gate, a second-tier Hollywood studio. Wanda’s global push is by far the most ambitious, however. It is aiming to become the first Chinese major studio on the global market, with Wang boldly declaring that “if one of the Big Six would be willing to be sold to us, we would be interested.”

He has already built the world’s largest cinema empire. As well as thousands of screens in China, Wanda owns major chains in the US and Australia.

[QUOTE]In some ways this is not new, it is just a new source of money
Stephen Follows

In July it added Britain’s biggest cinema operator, Odeon & UCI Cinemas, in a £921m deal with the private equity firm Terra Firma. Wanda seized the opportunity of the post-referendum fall in sterling to snap up an asset that had been on the block for over a year, despite having publicly said months earlier it was not interested.

The idea of building a film powerhouse comprising both production and exhibition is an old one, last tried in the West by Warner Bros in the 1990s. The emergence of China as the world’s largest box office, bringing with it the barriers and foibles of a planned economy, is leading some in the film industry to wonder whether this time the model will work.

Foreign investors have attempted to conquer Hollywood before and failed, but never has Hollywood so badly want to conquer a foreign market in return.

Veterans such as Roven recall a time when Japan appeared to offer a lucrative new market in the 1990s, only for Hollywood to be shut out by a resurgent domestic film industry. Yet all agree China is definitely something different.

“In some ways this is not new, it is just a new source of money,” Follows says. “But China is not going to go away. It is so big that whatever happens, the industry will be changed.”[/QUOTE]

I’m so glad that Daniel Wu tuned me into Warcraft. Watching this play out has been fascinating.

[GeneChing]

Our winners are announced!

See our WINNERS: Warcraft on BLU-RAY ™ + DVD + DIGITAL HD thread.

[GeneChing]

First forum review!

I totally get why this did so well in China and bombed here. It’s got exactly the kind of bombast China likes now - a major CGI effects show. You gotta LUV CGI to enjoy this. I mean, REALLY LUV CGI. This is all about CGI. It’s prolly best in 3D IMAX.

Story-wise, it poaches from everything - Harry Potter, LotR, Star Trek, Narnia, you name it. That’s fresher for China as they have not been exposed to some of these franchises with the same saturation as we have. For American audiences, it’s rather been there, done that. There’s some swordfights and and amusing ultravi (at least as much as PG13 allows). I confess to be entertained by orcs smushing knights in armor like soda cans. The armor was cool in that absurd fantasy sort of way. The whole design of it all, sets, CGI, costumes, was spectacular.

The orcs are ‘noble savages’ which feels a little derogatory nowadays with all of the racial tensions. The Dead Lands pulled this concept off well, but that’s because they did a lot of research in Maori culture. I’ve often said that Star Trek should do Worf’s World, an iteration done from the Klingon angle. This is somewhat like that. But with Klingons and Orcs, there’s no Maori culture or any cultural roots. It’s just made up, what screenwriters imagine the noble savage to be, and it’s often really shallow. Honor is bandied about and the culture is hyper violent, but metaphorically, there’s always this tone that while the savages are noble, they are still savages, primitive, crude and lower than first world culture.

It doesn’t really end either. It just teases the sequel.

Daniel Wu was almost unrecognizable as his voice was autotuned to sound more growly orcish. Also worthy of note, Warcraft stars Ruth Negga & Dominic Cooper from one of my guilty pleasures, AMCs Preacher, and although they don’t really shine in this like they do in that, it was amusing for me to see them in different roles.

[GeneChing]

The Warcraft Redemption

That’s my new term for films that were redeemed in China - ‘the Warcraft Redemption’.

OK, give me some time and maybe I’ll think up something better. :o

Who the hell watched “Warcraft”? China is fueling the market for overdone Hollywood action movies

If you build it, they will come. (Reuters/Stringer)

WRITTEN BY Ashley Rodriguez
OBSESSION Glass
March 28, 2017

Hollywood’s failed domestic blockbusters, like Warcraft and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, are among the highest-grossing movies in China—the world’s second-largest box office.
There, China’s 1.3 billion people are more drawn to Hollywood action movies with over-the-top visual effects than the fantasy sagas that lead in North America, John Zeng, president and board director at China’s Wanda Cinemas, said at CinemaCon this week, IndieWire reported.
That explains how Resident Evil: The Final Chapter and xXx: The Return of Xander Cage, which both bombed in the US, managed to beat out Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, and Beauty and the Beast—which topped the North American box office in 2015, 2016, and so far in 2017, respectively. (These movies were all released later in China than the US, with the exception of Beauty and the Beast.)

China alone made up half of Warcraft’s $433 million global box-office total. Domestically, it only brought in around $47 million, which was about 30% of the estimated $160 million it cost to make the movie, according to Box Office Mojo.

Chinese audiences are also resistant to Hollywood animation, Zeng reportedly said. That’s why big releases like Finding Dory and The Secret Life of Pets haven’t found as much success there as in the US. But some Hollywood titles with global appeal, like Zootopia, have been able to tap into China’s love for the genre.
And Chinese audiences love 3D movies, said Zeng, whose company also owns America’s largest theater chain, AMC Theatres, where 3D films don’t have the same cachet and are slowly disappearing. (Theaters charge more to watch a 3D film.)
China’s box office once threatened to overtake North America after nearly a decade of stupendous growth. But last year it hit a wall. China’s movie-ticket revenue grew less than 4% to 45.7 billion yuan ($6.6 billion), compared to a 48% lift the previous year, the Hollywood Reporter wrote, citing data from the state-run body that oversees film.
Zeng projected, through a translator at CinemaCon, that the Chinese box office will now grow between 15% and 20%, annually.

[GeneChing]

Slightly OT to the Warcraft Redemption

‘Zootopia 2’ Is A Huge Hit in China, and Disney Exec Jared Bush Knows Why

Disney’s story of imperfect partnerships struck a chord across Asia to the tune of $271 million after the studio spent nine years cultivating that fandom

Jeremy Fuster

Tue, December 2, 2025 at 6:05 AM PST

8 min read

“Zootopia 2” (Disney)

As Hollywood emerged out of the COVID pandemic into a new, more challenging status quo, one of the big shifts it had to adjust to was the end of China’s love affair with big American blockbusters.

Once a growing market that could push tentpole films into the $1 billion-plus global range, audiences in Beijing and beyond became disinterested in Hollywood movies, turning their attention (and box office) instead to local films like “Hi, Mom,” “Full River Red” and the new record holder for the highest-grossing animated film ever, “Ne Zha 2.”

But this past weekend, Disney’s “Zootopia 2” did more than just turn back the clock to the 2010s with its massive $271 million five-day opening in China. In just five days, “Zootopia 2” passed the entire $245 million Chinese run of “Avatar: The Way of Water” to become the highest-grossing American film in the country since the pandemic. On Monday, the film became the first MPA film since “Endgame” to pass 50 million admissions with a $14.4 million daily total.

With this start, the animated sequel to the 2016 animal pun-filled Oscar winner is on pace to pass the $632 million total of “Avengers: Endgame” as Hollywood’s highest-grossing film ever in China and crack the country’s top 10 all-time list.

The question on everyone’s minds in Hollywood now is, how did “Zootopia 2” break so big in China? And can it happen again?

In just five days, “Zootopia 2” topped all post-COVID American films at the Chinese box office.

“Zootopia 2” has a long way to go in theaters, but after its $559 million extended global launch, it is not out of the realm of possibility that it passes the $1.45 billion total of “Frozen II” to become Walt Disney Animation’s highest-grossing film ever, before inflation.

If it gets there, it will be because the universal story of “Zootopia” — or “Crazy Animal City,” as its Mandarin title translates to — resonated with millions of Chinese moviegoers in a way that has endured changing cinematic tastes, and because Disney spent the past nine years cultivating China’s love for Nick, Judy and the rest of their world’s furry denizens with merchandise, the “Zootopia+” spinoff Disney+ series, and most of all, a wildly popular theme park area at Shanghai Disneyland.

In other words, this theatrical success is the result of nearly a decade of hard work maintaining a fledgling franchise, and isn’t one that Hollywood will be able to easily replicate.

Cultivating a fanbase

Walt Disney Animation’s chief creative officer, Jared Bush, has been involved in that cultivation since the beginning as co-writer of both “Zootopia” films and director of “Zootopia 2” alongside Byron Howard. He told TheWrap that at the sequel’s premieres in Shanghai and Beijing, he met many Chinese fans who told him how much Judy and Nick meant to them.

“We always hope that our stories resonate around the world, but I could see from the premieres for this film in particular that people can really see themselves in these characters and in the emotional journey that Nick and Judy go through,” Bush said on Monday, after the film’s enormous box office success.

Jared Bush, Disney Animation chief creative officer and co-writer-director of “Zootopia 2,” at the premiere of “Moana 2” in 2024 (Disney)

In the first “Zootopia,” Judy leaves her small-town family to travel to the titular big city in the hopes of making a difference as the first rabbit to join its police department. That story of hopeful youth leaving home to pursue a career in the big city is a classic one in cinema and one that was personal to Bush as someone who grew up in the Washington, D.C. suburbs and who, like so many animators going back to Walt Disney himself a century ago, traveled to Los Angeles to chase his dreams.

But in 2016, that story was particularly resonant for young Chinese moviegoers trying to make their way in a country that was undergoing its own economic boom and rapid urbanization. With $236 million grossed, “Zootopia” was the highest-grossing Hollywood film in China in 2016, but compared to films like “Furious 7” and its $390 million total the year prior, it didn’t seem like an exceptional box office run at the time.

But “Zootopia” endured in the years that followed, with strong home platform viewing numbers and merch sales in China in 2017 and 2018. They were so strong that in 2019, Disney announced that “Zootopia” would make its first major entry into its global theme parks with an entire new section of Shanghai Disneyland, which opened in 2023.

There are versions of Tomorrowland, Pirates of the Caribbean and other staples of Disney’s signature Anaheim and Orlando parks in international Disney parks like the ones in Paris and Tokyo. But at least for now, the only place to see Zootopia come to life is in Shanghai, furthering the special connection fans there have with the movies.

Bush said it was a joy to work with Disney Imagineering turning the world his animators brought to the big screen into a tactile playground, so much so that several of the animal puns and gags that were created for the theme park ended up making their way into “Zootopia 2.”

“There was a barbershop for sheep where they style their wool and then bring the wool next door to make sweaters, and that was so brilliant that we used it in the car chase at the beginning of the film,” he said. “In the ride they designed for the park, Bellwether, the villain of the first film, dyed her wool purple, so we added that detail for the film as well.”

Leaning into the local language

Such visual playfulness has an appeal that transcends borders, but bringing that into reality in Shanghai allowed the pre-existing love for “Zootopia” in China to grow even more at a time when “Fast & Furious,” once wildly popular around the world, declined pretty much everywhere and Marvel, which had a foothold in China through “Avengers: Endgame,” was abandoned after films like “Spider-Man: No Way Home” and “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” were not approved by China’s film board for theatrical release.

And when it came time for “Zootopia 2” to hit theaters, Disney also turned to another key element of any global hit to ensure that the film’s story about Judy and Nick overcoming their differences and fighting to protect a marginalized community resonated with Chinese moviegoers: localization.

Just as Jason Bateman and Ginnifer Goodwin have won over Western critics and audiences with their chemistry as Nick and Judy, “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” star Chang Chen and veteran voice actress Ji Guanlin did the same in Asia, playing the two leads in the Mandarin dub of “Zootopia” — and they were brought back for the sequel. Like voice actors for all the dubs of “Zootopia,” they worked from a script that had to be significantly altered for each language for one simple reason: English puns like changing “before” to “be-fur” get lost in translation.

“We’re so lucky that we have collaborators worldwide that could not just translate our jokes and the story, but actually tailor it to the audiences,” Bush said. “And so you’ll get a wholesale different pun in different parts of the world that will work for that audience, and that, I think requires just a lot of people wanting to play in this toy box, understanding the tone and how to best convey to people from different cultures.”

It’s hard to say whether Hollywood could ever again generate another film that breaks through China’s general apathy towards its output like “Zootopia.” The industry is having a hard enough time getting American audiences to come to theaters for new ideas — no original animated film has grossed more than $200 million domestic or $500 million worldwide since the pandemic.

A “Zootopia 2”-themed exhibition in Chengdu, Sichuan Province of China. (Tang Wanwei/VCG via Getty Images)

And if the answer to breaking back into China was as simple as talking animals, movies like “The Bad Guys” and “Kung Fu Panda 4” — the latter of which is the sequel to a DreamWorks film that was once the gold standard for Hollywood winning over Chinese moviegoers — would have been big hits. Instead, those films made around $50 million in the country.

The story of “Zootopia 2” in China, with its historic opening weekend, wildly successful theme park spinoff and more than 125 partnerships with Chinese and global brands, is an example of a Hollywood studio taking organic excitement around an original story and spending a decade sustaining and growing it in ways that never felt like a foreign company trying to pander to a culture it isn’t rooted in. And for Bush, it has been particularly gratifying to hear from Chinese audiences how invested they are in the relationship between the film’s two lead characters, Judy and Nick.

“I think the first and most important thing that we tried to make sure that we accomplished was to make sure that the story always revolved around the Judy and Nick dynamic, that relationship,” he said. “They are an imperfect partnership. There’s something about these two characters who are different, who start to worry that those differences are going to get in the way of this partnership, but work through that and see each other on a deeper level.”

Bush continued, “That’s something that we all do as human beings.”