[阅读小分队] 【揽瓜阁 外刊精读7.0】Day5 2021.04.16【人文科学-电影、历史】

After her mother dies, Jia (Jia Ling) is magically transported back in time to 1981. She falls from the sky onto the pavement of the factory campus where her mother, Li (Xiaofei Zhang), was working at the time. Posing as a distant cousin, Jia befriends her parent and attempts to change the course of her life. She encourages Li to marry a prosperous man so that she might be better off and produce a slimmer, more successful and more eligible daughter. Jia had feared her flaws made her unworthy of her mother’s affection, yet in the end it becomes clear that Li loved her daughter dearly.

With its echoes of “Back to the Future”, “Hi, Mom” is a hit in China: since its release in early February the movie has grossed more than 5bn yuan ($768m) at the box office. It is currently the second-highest-grossing film ever released in the country, and may yet overtake “Wolf Warrior 2”, an action film from 2017. In 2011 China’s broadcasting regulator, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, said that it disapproved of time-travel dramas which “treat serious history in a frivolous way”. The more intimate focus of “Hi, Mom” seems to have pleased audiences and censors alike.

Written and directed by Ms Jia, the film is adapted from her comedy routine from 2016 which explored her relationship with her mother, who died in an accident when Ms Jia was 19. At a time when many people have been separated from their families, the themes of grief and filial piety in “Hi, Mom” resonated. On social media, the #PhotoOfMyMotherWhenSheWasYoung challenge encouraged thousands of netizens to post snaps of their carefree family members. Some even went as far as to give their parents advice (“Don’t Marry Dad!”) while others gushed over the women’s beauty.

The film’s impressive box-office receipts are also a stark reminder of the health of the industry in China compared with Hollywood. In the West cinemas remain closed due to lockdown or operate at limited capacity; in China, where many restrictions have been lifted, between 50% and 75% of seats are available to book. During the Spring Festival (the New Year holiday), Chinese cinemas made an estimated $1.5bn in ticket sales—71% of takings at the American box office in all of 2020.

The industry was given a particular boost over Chinese New Year since many large private companies and state-owned enterprises did not allow their employees to travel as a precaution against the spread of the coronavirus. That meant that millions of people were separated from their families over the holiday, with little else to do but go to the movies or go out to eat. It appears they did both—restaurants also did a roaring trade in the same period.

The success of “Hi, Mom” also illustrates the increasing popularity of domestic productions. When Hollywood films first began to be distributed in China in the 1990s, they brought about a new enthusiasm for moviegoing. The import of six American blockbusters in 1995, including “The Lion King” and “True Lies”, accounted for an 80% increase in attendance in Beijing over the previous year. The Chinese government hoped that this eagerness would benefit local productions, too, and built new cinemas across the country, but most domestic films still failed to recoup their costs.

The picture is rather different today. Ellen Eliasoph, a film executive who established Warner Bros’ office in China in 1993, and who has worked in Beijing since, now believes “there’s a glass ceiling in China for Hollywood movies”. She notes that the only Hollywood film to have ever crossed the 3bn yuan mark in China is “Avengers: Endgame” (2019). Until the beginning of the pandemic, China was distributing roughly 35 films a year from Hollywood and foreign territories; but with cinemas shut, film-sales agents stopped bringing movies to market.

That has given locally made films a chance to excel. Since 2013, domestic films have taken around 60% of total box-office earnings. In 2021, that number may get closer to 100%.