Hollywood long ago stopped asking if it will play in Peoria. Paramount Pictures (VIA), like just about everyone else selling mass-market products, wants to make sure it plays in Chongqing—and the studio’s latest film passed that test. Sometime this week the Transformers reboot will pass $222 million in sales at Chinese theaters, besting a record set by Avatar in 2010. The film, it’s worth noting, is a critical flop that barely topped such other recent blockbusters as Godzilla and Captain America: Winter Soldier in its home market.
Part of the success can be attributed to the sheer scale of the Chinese movie market. China’s total box office revenue last year surged 27 percent, to $3.6 billion, according to the Motion Picture Association of America. Infrastructure is no longer a challenge for Hollywood’s efforts in the Far East. Transformers: Age of Extinction opened in 4,400 theaters in China, more than the 4,233 locations in the U.S. Paramount’s fighting robots are making more money on a per-theater basis in China as well.
The results are impressive, and they should be since Paramount went to great lengths to prime Chinese crowds to swoon for Optimus Prime and company. Four of the film’s actors were cast via a Chinese reality show, some of the action is actually set in the People’s Republic, and the Transformer’s marketing machine has been churning away in China for weeks.
via Transformers Breaks China’s Box-Office Record as Strategy Shifts – Businessweek.
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