Despite a massive marketing push and a record-breaking first weekend, the latest installment of the Star Wars film franchise has quickly lost momentum at the Chinese box office, raising doubts that it will be able to rise to the levels of Avatar and Titantic.
Despite having to wait for a 2016 release due to the permitted quota for foreign film running out last November, Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens opened with a record-breaking $53 million box office weekend on January 9 and went on to rake in $97.5 million over the next nine days.
Despite the impressive opening numbers, Star Wars made just $14.8 million in its second weekend, a drop of 70 percent. The Force Awakens lost the weekend top spot to the latest installment of the Chinese animated franchise, Boonie Bears. To make matters worse, Star Wars lost two-thirds of its showtimes to new releases in China.
With the film’s performance in China falling short of expectations, it appears unlikely that Star Wars: The Force Awakens will break the world box office records, currently held by Avatar and Titanic. To put the numbers in perspective, The Force Awakens has earned $150 million less than last year’s highest-grossing Hollywood film in China, Furious 7, which made $390 million.
Since previous films in the Star Wars franchise had not received a commercial release in China, there was a strong marketing push to entice Chinese filmgoers. Pop singer Lu Han (shown above) served as a spokesperson for the film in China, and even released a Star Wars themed music video.
China Film Insider reported that younger Chinese audiences found Star Wars: The Force Awakens to be “boring”, were “confused by the plot”, and even witnessed “snoring during screenings”.
While the robot stars of the Transformers films were immensely successful in China, it would appear that these aren’t the droids Chinese audiences are looking for.