Why Hollywood Is Relying on China to Halt a Box Office Slide
The slowdown is one reason the Motion Picture Association of America, which represents the six biggest Hollywood
studios, recently hired an accounting firm to audit the box-office figures reported by Chinese theaters.
By BROOKS BARNESJULY 13, 2017
LOS ANGELES — All year, Hollywood executives have been brushing aside worries about box-office stagnation in the United States
and Canada by pointing to strong ticket sales in China.
American movie executives are also pushing for shorter blackout periods, which China uses to promote local films,
and longer marketing windows; under the current setup, Hollywood studios are given only about a month to mount advertising campaigns for their movies
Ticket sales for imported films in China are up 34 percent this year, to roughly $2.3 billion, according to the Beijing research firm EntGroup.
In North America, ticket sales for the summer are down 8 percent, compared with the same
period in 2016, according to comScore; box-office revenue for the year to date is flat.
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