China’s film distributors have called for diversifying the country’s cinematic offerings with more and better titles from overseas, at a time when domestic productions have seized the lion’s share of the market from their imported competitors.
At a work conference held by the state-owned China Film Group Corporation, as well as Huaxia Film Distribution, companies vowed to bring in “good titles from multiple countries” to improve the number, quality and market share of foreign films, state media outlet China Film News reported on Monday.
Distributors at the meeting also committed to “leveraging imported films’ positive effect of diversifying and expanding the market.”
Foreign films in China have been in a “harsh” situation this year, with box office returns lagging behind their domestic rivals, distributors said at the Friday meeting.
“[We] should encourage more good international films to enter the Chinese film market,” said Mao Yu, an associate director of the Communist Party’s publicity department, which oversees regulation of the film industry.
By mid-May, 26.6 billion yuan (US$3.7 billion) in box office revenue had been recorded for 2025, more than 60 per cent of the returns for all of 2024, according to state broadcaster CCTV. Almost 96 per cent of the take was attributed to domestic titles.
