Jackie Chan thinks the success in China of video game adaptation Warcraft: The Beginning could lead to an increase in homegrown blockbusters.
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Having finally been released in North America after a couple of weeks of global screenings, Warcraft didn’t find its feet domestically – but like X-Men: Apocalypse last week, it’s been saved by worldwide takings. With a $160 million dollar budget, very bad reviews and a $24 million dollar US Box Office it looked like this was going to be a monumental flop.
Warcraft, based on Activision Blizzard’s World of Warcraft game, may generate as much as 2 billion yuan in China, according to Nomura Holdings, which would make it China’s second-highest-grossing movie this year.
Big-time films return to the box office next weekend, when Walt Disney Co.’s Pixar releases Finding Dory, a sequel to Finding Nemo, and on June 24 with the debut of 20 Century Fox’s sci-fi follow-up Independence Day: Resurgence.
With recent news that veteran action/suspense helmer Renny Harlin is jumping over to an ambitious Alibaba-produced fantasy epic based on the Chinese video game series Legend of the Ancient Sword, the success of Warcraft could solidify what already seems to be a growing trend as Hollywood looks to market its big-budgeted CGI epics toward the East. That topped the $24.4 million opening of Warcraft, from Universal Pictures and the $23 million debut of Now You See Me 2 from Lions Gate Entertainment Corp., which landed in third place. However, Warcraft does have Vin Diesel and the gang beat in terms of the IMAX format in its midnight screenings, generating a $5.3 million (35 million rmb) that pulled ahead of the $4.7 million (31 million rmb) of Furious. Timed for public holiday the Dragon Boat Festival, it yielded $156 million in five days.
The director is now waiting to see how the film performs at the box office but admits that there have been discussions about a trilogy of movies.
“Warcraft’s” performance in China flew past the high-water mark set for a foreign release in 2015 with “Avengers: Age of Ultron”.
In scope, the number is huge.
It is you, not us who makes China powerful.
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Moviegoers in the US will have their opportunity to see if the Chinese are onto something when Warcraft at theaters on June 10 (this Friday).
