China's State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT) suspended the license of a film distributor who was found guilty of inflating the box office numbers of the martial arts flick "Ip Man 3." The distribution of the film released on March 4 too has been suspended.
"Ip Man 3," starring former world heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson and Chinese superstar Donnie Yen, is alleged to have fudged thousands of screenings in a gigantic box office fraud, SAPPRFT said. It may seem incredible, but the Chinese film industry figures show that the move earned over 500 million Yuan ($77 million) in just four days within its release on the mainland, AFP reported. The figures are much more compared to what "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" earned during the same period.
The film's distributor Beijing Max Screen purchased tickets worth 56 million Yuan itself, thereby fabricating over 7,600 screenings, which the company claimed earned them an additional 32 million Yuan, the official newspaper of SAPPRFT said.
Observers in China's film industry as well as the moviegoers were suspicious about the screening schedule of "Ip Man3" all through its opening weekend. In fact, many top mobile ticketing apps in China, which account for more than 70 percent of Chinese movie tickets sales, showed "house full" "Ip Man 3" screenings running at 10-minute intervals until 3 a.m. at some cinemas. Such a frequent schedule is completely unfeasible, The Hollywood Reporter stated.
Initially, Max Screen denied any wrongdoing initially, but later issued a statement that read the company had "studied and fully accepted" the punishment.
It is worth noting that currently the Chinese film sector is growing at a momentous rate and it is expected that China will surpass North America as the world's largest theatrical market by mid-2017. However, the stupendous growth of the country's film industry has been sporadically marred by box office frauds.
There have been several instances when cinema chains in the country deliberately under-reported and embezzled revenue from ticket sales. On the other hand, sometimes they have connived with distributors to enhance the apparent performance of movies, making them seem to be runaway hits, like in the instance of the "Ip Man 3."
To some extent, such frauds are inevitable in a young industry. However, box office fraud has turned out to be a very serious issue, proving to be detrimental for Chinese cinema, the report quoted head of the film bureau Zhang Hongsen as saying.
Watch the "Ip Man 3" official trailer below: