Mixed reception for Home Coming, top film at the box office in China on National Day holiday
- Home Coming, drama based on real events about diplomats evacuating Chinese citizens from a war-torn country, hogged the box office on National Day in China
- However, it took much less than last year’s box office king, and other films vying for a share of holiday ticket sales have been a disappointment too so far
Box office takings at Chinese cinemas this year will not make good reading for owners or filmmakers, judging by ticket sales on October 1. The first day of the seven-day National Day holiday is seen as a benchmark for annual box office performance, and takings this year were down by nearly 58 per cent compared to a year earlier.
A record low seven new films were premiered during the holiday. Usually, competition for opening slots over the National Day holiday is fierce.
Moreover, the number of film-goers on October 1 was down more than 50 per cent year on year, to 6.39 million, according to data from Alibaba, owner of the South China Morning Post.
It did not help that thousands of cinemas did not open because of China’s “dynamic zero” Covid policy. On average one in six were shut, but in the worst-hit regions, such as Xinjiang, Tibet and Ningxia, fewer than one in ten were operating.
While there are still four days of the holiday left, it will be difficult for cinemas to make up lost ground. From 2019 to 2021, the share of annual box office takings accounted for by takings over the seven-day National Day holiday was 6.96 per cent, 19.57 per cent and 9.32 per cent, respectively.
