Nicholas Cage.jpg (Photo : Reuters)
As the second largest film market in the world, China can have more co-productions with Hollywood soon, according to a top Chinese entertainment industry lawyer.
"There is not a big number of co-productions but the box office revenues are enormous. Co-productions between China and the U.S. is a trend and could be a huge success," Beijing-based Yingke Law Firm senior partner Allen Wang told the Hollywood Reporter at the American Film Market.
For Wang, the things needed include "the Hollywood method of storytelling," the talent, the directors and the production technology.
"For the Chinese we can do the financing and we have the target market for the films. It's a good opportunity," Wang said.
At the recent U.S.-China Film Summit in Los Angeles, the China Film Co-production Corporation's new president Miao Xiaotian said that China was prepared to have more co-productions, which are excluded from the quota system that restricts foreign films allowed into the country, Variety reported.
According to Miao, only 5 percent of the 80 applications in 2014 were rejected and "they typically all make the same mistakes." The 65 percent have been approved so far "with most of the others currently under review by the Film Bureau."
In recent years, getting co-production status became more difficult because of the projects that tried to add Chinese elements to films that were clearly Western, which irked film bureau authorities.
For Miao, a Hollywood-China co-production needs "cultural elements from both countries and at least one lead actor."
"Having a U.S. director is not be a problem. The prod team can be from Hollywood as long as we can see the Chinese elements on screen," Miao explained.
While Miao did not offer exact definitions of topics that are too politically sensitive, he cited an unnamed French film with Chinese environmental pollution theme as an example.
He also admitted that there have not been many films that have equally appealed to American and Chinese audiences so far.
"I cannot tell you which ones will work, that is the job of the filmmakers to find, but I am confident that there will be in future," he said.
The American-Chinese-Canadian co-production "Outcast" starring Nicolas Cage and Hayden Christensen will be relaunched in China in Jan. 2015.
