China’s summer box office has crossed the RMB20bn ($2.75bn) threshold for the first time, taking the country’s year-to-date gross to nearly $6bn.
According to official data published by government agency China Film Administration, $2.87bn (RMB20.62bn) box office sales were generated from 505 million cinema admission from June 1 – August 31. The star performers were all local productions, which occupied the top six spots at the box office and accounted for 87.6% of the market share.
According to ticketing platform Maoyan, the runaway champion was No More Bets, directed by Shen Ao and produced by Ning Hao. The crime drama, which depicts the brutal inside story of cyber-fraud based on real cases, raked in $490m (RMB3.5bn), narrowly surpassing mystery drama Lost In The Stars.
They were followed by further local films with diverse characters and stories that catered to a wide audience. These included Wuershan’s fantasy epic Creation Of The Gods I: King Of Storms, Wang Baoqiang’s motivational drama Never Say Never, Tang dynasty animation Chang An and Da Peng’s street dance film One And Only.
While local films continued to shine, US productions remained sluggish at the box office. Sino-US co-production Meg 2: The Trench took $114.7m (RMB 825.6m) and ranked seventh, despite Chinese action star Wu Jing joining a cast led by Jason Statham.
According to separate data provided by Artisan Gateway, China’s box office from January to August 2023 reached $5.9bn (RMB42.8bn) - down 4.7% on the same period in 2019.
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