China Meiguo

The Chinese film industry has been growing dramatically in recent years although it is still quite small for a country with the world's second biggest economy and largest population. In 2010, box office income in China increased by 64% to reach U.S. $1.5 billion.

Hollywood still dominates the movies in most of the world as illustrated by the fact that Avatar was the biggest grossing film for 2010, taking in $204 million in China. However, there were a number of very successful Chinese films as well, led by Feng Xiaogang's (冯小刚) Aftershock which earned over $100 million. If you can find it with English subtitles, Aftershock (唐山大地震; Tángshān Dàdìzhèn) is well worth watching and is based on the true event of an earthquake with a fictional story about a family that suffered resulting personal aftershocks long after the earthquake ended.

Despite the positive growth in the Chinese film industry, the Chinese government realizes that the rate of growth is not close to equal to overall economic growth. A Washington Post article quotes a Chinese film bureau report stating that "A 10 billion yuan box office ... is still far from the value of a movie world power and is still far from keeping pace with the country's economic growth." The report is also quoted as saying:

Hopefully this realization may further incentivize the Chinese government to take steps to help encourage growth of the Chinese film by reducing piracy and promoting a less restrictive environment for Chinese filmmakers. Despite significant challenges (piracy of movies on DVD and on the Internet, etc.), growth is sure to continue and the China Film Producers Association predicts that the Chinese film industry will become the world's second biggest worth about U.S. $6 billion by 2015. An extreme rate of growth would be needed for this prediction to come true, but its not impossible considering how great China's overall economic growth has been over the past several decades.