Mumbai: Imax CEO Richard Gelfond doesn‘t expect many Hollywood films to clash at local multiplexes in China. He told the Goldman Sachs‘ Communacopia conference that Chinese authorities directing screen traffic in the Asian market weren‘t impressed with the results when Warner Bros.‘ The Dark Knight Rises and Columbia Pictures‘ The Amazing Spider-Man opened simultaneously in China on Imax screens on 27 August.
"My guess is they‘re going to rethink that," Gelfond told investors.
Gelfond argued the cannibalisation was less about reducing slots for Hollywood movies than opening up screen time for Chinese films to bring the ratio of local and foreign movies in China more into balance.
"Instead of two Hollywood films stretching out over two months, they wanted one month for Chinese films," Gelfond said while speaking on creating black-out periods for non-domestic films by bunching Hollywood titles.
Gelfond, who was in China last week,as part to hold discussions with government authorities, said the arms-length China Film Group, that charges a fee to import foreign titles, makes less money when Hollywood films don‘t follow one after the other.
And Chinese exhibitors make less money as well, and are more interested in attracting consumers to their shopping malls by building multiplexes, than protecting local films.