Chinese have high hopes for exporting big-budget Great Wall epic fantasy
Shanghai — Dalian Wanda Group’s action-fantasy epic Great Wall debuts in China on Friday with more at stake than just the $150m spent making it. As the most expensive film yet shot in China and the first major Chinese-American co-production, it is also a test of blockbuster demand in a cinema market that slipped from boom to bust. Prospects of the film drawing audiences across continents have also raised hopes that it will be the new model for China-Hollywood collaboration. Starring Matt Damon and directed by the celebrated Zhang Yimou of China, Great Wall got under way as a project when box-office sales were surging more than 35% a year. Now, years later, ticket sales have dropped for three months running. Some ask if this is because films are getting worse, audiences getting pickier or both. "I know what the movie would do in last year’s market, but I don’t know what it’s going to do this December," producer Peter Loehr said in Beijing last week. Loehr, who is also CEO of Wanda un...
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