好莱坞进军中国

    刚过去的一个周末是好莱坞的大日子，不过在奥斯卡奖庆典过后，美国电影业还得回归到资金匮乏的工作状态。包括好莱坞巨星克里斯蒂安•贝尔在内的许多电影人，都正在逐渐接受一个事实——中国是他们的新大陆。

    中国电影业的发展速度甚至让最乐观的乐观主义者都感到震惊。2005年，中国电影业的产值只有2.5亿美元，相比好莱坞的230亿美元，可谓微不足道。当时有些看好中国电影的人认为，到2010年，中国电影业产值会增至2005年的三倍，不过唱反调的人却大摇其头。他们表示，中国电影业的审查制度太严苛了，而且中国电影的艺术性不强。然而事实证明，中国电影在最乐观的预测的基础上还翻了一倍多。去年中国电影的票房收入超过15亿美元。按照当前的增长率走下去，到2015年，中国电影的票房有望达到70亿美元。

    这些专家的预测之所以与实际情况相差甚远，大概是由于他们忽视了中国政府对其生机勃勃的电影业进行了多少投资。中国正在努力构建一个消费型社会，而看电影对于一个消费型社会的发展起着重要的作用。自从2005年以来，政府大力推进基础设施项目的投资，其中就包括在主要城市投资兴建新的电影院。现在中国各地已经有6000多个放映厅，其中许多放映设备都是数码的。而且据中国政府的报告，中国平均每天都有三家新电影院开张。

    中国电影的内容也有了提高。在过去10年的大部分时间里，中国的电影公司拍摄了大量关于中国历史的古装戏，这些片子一般都遵循着同样的政治路线。这些电影公司几乎都是由中国电影集团（China Film Group）支持的，而中国电影集团是中国最具影响力的国有电影制片和电影发行企业。不过，在过去的两年里，中国出现了更多多样化的电影，比如讲述地震故事的情节片《唐山大地震》，和一部诙谐的中式西部大片《让子弹飞》，二者各赚到了1亿美元以上的国内票房收入。

    就连用于政治宣传的电影也借鉴了好莱坞的手法，在艺术上有了创新，从而实现了更高的票房收入。2009年，中国为了纪念毛泽东主席以及革命胜利60周年而拍摄了献礼片《建国大业》，近200位中国最出名的演员都在电影中露面，其中包括功夫巨星成龙和李连杰。这部电影由于其艺术的完整性而广受赞誉。如今，商业上的成功正在为中国电影拉来更多的投资，关于中国电影业的增长的预言已经自行应验了。

中国与好莱坞：爱恨交织

    和大多数与中国经济的繁荣发展有关的故事一样，中国电影业的崛起，也远比其表面的样子更为复杂。而现在好莱坞也萌发了打入中国市场的兴趣，这无疑更为中国电影平添了一层复杂性。

    从历史上看，中国与好莱坞的关系历来笼罩着一层怀疑和厌恶之情。首先，中国猖獗的盗版和知识产权问题一直让好莱坞恼怒不已——具体说来，美国电影人平均每年都会为此损失数十亿美元。

    此外还有市场准入问题和收入分成问题。中国一向对外国电影实行配额制度，每年只允许20部美国电影进入中国市场，这个限制比大多数国家都严格得多。其次，由于票房利润分成合同十分苛刻，即便是那些获准进入中国的电影也很难获利。

    例如去年电影《阿凡达》（Avatar）在中国的票房收入达到2亿美元，但制片方获得的比例只有10%到15%。在其他多数国家，这个标准都在50%上下。尽管最近世贸组织（WTO）明确规定，中国的电影分销网络必须对本国和外国公司一视同仁，不过一位擅长中国知识产权法的律师史蒂夫•迪金森指出，美国电影业不必对这项规定感到过于兴奋。“多年以来，美国电影业一直希望找到打开中国市场的方法。世贸组织的这项决定并不会让他们在这个问题上有任何进展。”

    尽管如此，随着好莱坞的利润日渐缩水，中国在利益链中的比重也越来越大。中国的市场仍比不上日本和欧洲，而且与其他国家相比，中国的利益分成或许令人头痛，不过中国毕竟是全世界增长最快的市场。印度虽然也是一个大市场，但印度已经有了符合观众品味的“宝莱坞”，因此相比之下，印度的潜力也不如中国。

    中国也可以从好莱坞身上获得很多好处。虽然有少数极为成功的中国演员、导演和制片人处在电影业的金字塔尖上，但是中国的编剧和导演人才并未得到积极的培养。尽管各地兴建了越来越多的电影院，但是可供演员和导演进行学习的院校却少得可怜。例如在北京电影学院的导演班里，每期只有不超过30名学员。北京某电影公司的一位制片助理说道，他读到的剧本要么是全盘抄袭好莱坞大片，要么就是无脑的浪漫喜剧。这些都限制了中国国产电影自主发展的速度。

中美电影人的联姻能否一直维系下去？

    中国电影如何才能走向国际？好莱坞如何才能在中国赚钱？如果二者能够建立创造性的合作关系，则或许不失为一种解决之道。很少有人指望短期内中国政府会进一步开放电影市场，因此许多好莱坞电影公司的老板们选择退而求其次，通过与中国电影公司进行合作的方式进入中国市场。而中国似乎也满足于这种模式——尤其是因为这种模式有助于中国发展自己的电影业。因此，现在“中美合作”的模式正在遍地开花。例如《黑天鹅》的制片人迈克•麦德沃伊出生于上海，他现在正在与北京一家电影发行商合作，帮助中国电影走向国际。克里斯蒂安•贝尔最近也与一家中国电影公司签约，即将成为一部中国国产电影的主角。

    不过，这种合作关系并非没有潜在的危险。去年中国就向好莱坞的电影公司发出了一个信息：如果你诓我们，我们就会让你的日子很难过。这个信息直接针对好莱坞高层。例如美国知名的制片人、电影大亨哈维•韦恩斯坦的电影《谍海风云》原计划在上海拍摄，不过由于中国政府拒绝让韦恩斯坦在上海取景，因此韦恩斯坦只得在伦敦和曼谷拍摄此片。显然，韦恩斯坦多次买进中国电影，但又不发行这些电影的做法已经惹恼了中国政府。

    虽然在电影《谍海风云》发布时，韦恩斯坦说了很多关于中国电影业的溢美之辞，不过这还不够。中国的国有媒体发表了许多电影人对韦恩斯坦的刻薄评论。例如中国的大牌导演冯小刚——也就是《唐山大地震》的导演，就公然称韦恩斯坦是“骗子”。

    坦率地说，这种争执对中美两国都没什么好处。中国需要利用国产电影业推进商业和消费文化，而好莱坞也需要在这个过程中分得一杯羹，为了满足两者的需要，必须建立起一个合适的中间地带，使中国电影人可以和西方电影人进行合作，并从这些西方电影人身上学到东西。

    最后，一部电影必须是好电影，才能卖得出去。一位接受了美国教育的中国银行家兼电影发烧友雄辩地指出：中国电影业要想在国际水平上进行竞争，那么中国电影人就必须拍摄一些现实题材的电影，讲述对中国来说重要的事情。要想把电影卖出去，他们必须弄懂如何把这些故事包装成电影，然后展示给全世界。

    译者：朴成奎

    It's Hollywood's big weekend, but after the celebrations the industry will return to work on Monday in the same cash-strapped state it was in before the Oscars. Many in the business -- including Christian Bale -- are slowly embracing the fact that China is their new frontier.

    The speed at which the Chinese film industry has grown has surprised even the most jubilant of optimists. In 2005, the industry was worth just $250 million, compared to Hollywood's $23 billion. China bulls speculated that its industry might triple by 2010, while naysayers shook their heads. Too much censorship, they said, and not enough artistry. Instead, China's movie business has more than doubled even the most aggressive forecasts -- box office receipts topped $1.5 billion last year, and at its current rate of growth sales could reach $7 billion by 2015.

    What the experts seem to have discounted is just how invested the Chinese government is in a vibrant film industry. Movie watching plays a critical role in the development of a consumerist society, something China is working hard to create. Since 2005, the government has invested heavily in infrastructure projects, including new theaters in China's major cities. There are now more than 6,000 screens in the country -- many of them digital -- and the government reports that three new theaters are opening every day.

    The content appears to be evolving as well. For most of the last decade, Chinese production houses, nearly all of them backed by China Film Group, the country's most influential state-run filmmaking and film distribution enterprise, produced costume dramas about the history of China that generally followed a very specific political line. In the last two years, more diverse films have emerged, such as Aftershock, an earthquake melodrama, and Let the Bullets Fly, a witty Chinese Western, each made over $100 million in local box office sales.

    Even the propaganda films have learned from Hollywood and are evolving artistically -- and selling better as a consequence. In 2009, The Founding of the Republic, China's celebration of Chairman Mao that coincided with the 60th anniversary of the Communist revolution, starred nearly 200 of China's best-known actors, including Kung Fu legends like Jackie Chan and Jet Li, and was widely praised for its artistic integrity. Now, the scent of commercial success seems to be fueling more investment and turning Chinese film industry growth into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

China and Hollywood: A love-hate affair

    Like most stories connected to the booming Chinese economy, the rise of China's film industry is far more complex than it might at first seem -- and Hollywood's budding interest in tapping Chinese markets is certainly adding yet another layer of complication.

    Historically, China's relationship with Hollywood has been characterized by skepticism and antipathy. For starters, rampant piracy and intellectual property issues in China continue to rub Hollywood the wrong way -- and, much more concretely, cost U.S. filmmakers billions of dollars every year.

    There's also the issue of market access and dismal revenue splits. China has historically upheld a quota system granting only twenty U.S. films per year access to Chinese markets -- a far more restrictive regime than those of most countries. Even those films that are granted access to China face major difficulties making profits, due to highly restrictive box-office profit sharing agreements.

    Avatar, for instance, made $200 million in China last year, but the proportion of the box-office receipts that went to the studio were between 10-15%. In most other countries, around 50% is standard. And China shows no signs of changing, despite a high profile recent WTO decision declaring that China must give equal treatment to foreigners as it does to domestic companies in its film distribution network. Steve Dickinson, a lawyer specializing in China intellectual property law, urges the U.S. film industry not to get too excited about the ruling: "The American film industry has been trying to find ways to break open the China market for years. This decision doesn't get them anywhere on that issue."

    All the same, as Hollywood's profits shrink, China becomes an ever-larger part of the profit equation. China remains a smaller market than Japan or Europe, and the revenue splits may be terrible compared to those in other countries, but China is the fastest-growing market in the world. India, another big market, already has well-developed audience tastes for Bollywood, so it's less of a potential goldmine.

    And China has much to gain from Hollywood. Although there is a small group of actors, directors, and producers at the top of the movie business who are extraordinarily successful, talent among screenwriters and directors isn't actively cultivated. And even though more theaters are being built, there are few institutes where actors and directors can study. In a director's class at the Beijing Film Academy, for instance, there are no more than 30 people in class at one time. A production assistant at a Beijing production house says that the scripts he reads are almost universally knock-off derivations of Hollywood blockbuster films or mindless romantic comedies. At least in the near-term, all this significantly limits how quickly China can develop its domestic film industry working on its own.

Riding into the sunset together?

    How, then, can China go global -- and how can Hollywood make a buck over there? Creative partnerships appear to be at least part of the solution. Since so few people expect the government to open the market further in the near term, many Hollywood studio bosses seeking entry into the Chinese market are settling for co-production arrangements with Chinese partners. China appears to be content with this status quo -- particularly because it may help them grow their own industry. Given all this, partnerships are proliferating. Mike Medavoy, the producer of the Black Swan, who was born in Shanghai, is working with a Beijing film promoter to help Chinese films go global. Christian Bale recently signed on to be the leading role of a Chinese domestic film.

    This kind of collaboration is not without its potential pitfalls. Last year China sent a message to Hollywood filmmakers: if you cross us, we'll make life hard for you. The message went straight to the top. Harvey Weinstein, the famed American producer-mogul, had to shift production for his film Shanghai from Shanghai itself to London and Bangkok after the Chinese government refused to allow Weinstein to film there. Apparently, Weinstein had irked Beijing by buying Chinese movies but not distributing them.

    Although Weinstein made flattering public statements about the Chinese film industry when Shanghai was released, it wasn't enough. State-run media published vitriolic remarks about Weinstein from a slew of filmmakers. One of China's biggest directors, Feng Xiaogang, who made Aftershock, publically called Weinstein a "cheater."

    These kinds of spats, frankly, help neither country. For China to utilize its domestic film industry to promote business and consumer culture, and for Hollywood to productively participate in this project, a suitable middle-ground must be found in which Chinese film-makers collaborate with and learn from their Western counterparts.

    At the end of the day, a movie has to be good for it to sell. One U.S.-educated Chinese banker, an avid filmgoer, puts it eloquently: If the Chinese industry wants to compete on an international level, then Chinese filmmakers should start producing movies about what's important to China. To sell, they must figure out how to package such stories as films, and then show the world.