Lunar New Year, Chinese Cinema Predicted To Harvest Up To IDR 19.2 Trillion

JAKARTA - The Chinese New Year holiday is like Eid in Indonesia. Many families take advantage of the time for family gatherings during the holidays. One of the activities that we do together is watching movies in the cinema.

Analysts expect China's box office earnings to rise as the Lunar New Year holiday period begins on February 1, The Hollywood Reporter said on Monday. "This year's Lunar New Year season could reach new highs of RMB 8 billion to RMB 8.5 billion (IDR 18.1 billion to IDR 19.2 trillion)", said the president of the film industry consultancy Artisan Gateway, Rance Pow as quoted by ANTARA on Monday, January 31.

During last year's Lunar New Year, cinema ticket sales reached a record 1.2 billion US dollars (IDR 17.2 trillion). The family comedy “Hi, Mom” led the box office at the time with a total gross of 821 million US dollars (IDR 11.8 trillion).

Cinema ticket revenues over the seven-day holiday amounted to 16.6 percent of China's full-year box office total and the full month of February took 25 percent of sales for the year.

The film "The Battle at Lake Changjin 2: Water Gate Bridge" which premiered Tuesday, February 1 is expected to lead the Chinese box office. This sequel tells the story of China's victory over the US in a key battle during the Korean War.

Co-directed by Chen Kaige, Tsui Hark and Dante Lam, the franchise's first film was released last September and became the highest-grossing Chinese film of all time, grossing $901.5 million.

The Global Times newspaper reported that the film was leading the ticket pre-sale record by grossing 5.64 million US dollars (IDR 81.2 billion) about a week before release. The Global Times even estimates that “The Battle at Lake Changjin 2” will be the first Chinese film to earn more than 1 billion US dollars (IDR 14.4 trillion).

However, China's box office earnings are sometimes difficult to predict accurately, especially when they get negative reactions from the audience after a few hours of release.

"Social word of mouth in China can be a strong determinant of a film's commercial success, and the market has demonstrated the ability to adapt to audience preferences if pre-season favorites are not launched quickly", said Pow.

Apart from “The Battle at Lake Changjin 2”, films that are competing at the Chinese box office include “Nice View” by director Wen Muye, “Only Fools Rush In” by director Han Han, “Sharpshooter” by director Zhang Yimou, and “Too Cool to Kill” by director Xing Wenxiong.