Xi Jinping agrees. Same day Bollywood releases in China, a reality soon.

By SOUMYADIPTA BANERJEE on April 30, 2018 • ( Leave a comment )

In an unprecedented gesture, Chinese President Xi Jinping has told Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi that his country is ready to provide all the necessary support to release Bollywood movies in a much bigger and coordinated way.

It has now been confirmed that the Indian prime minister has agreed to the Chinese proposal.

It is also learnt that the Chinese premiere has asked for more Bollywood movies to be released in China because his “countrymen just loves Bollywood movies”.

The Chinese president actually wants Bollywood movies to simultaneously release in China as it happens in Dubai or the UK.

China and India will soon be working together to establish a content sharing and marketing model where China will see a simultaneous release of Bollywood films along with India.

Right now, Bollywood movies are simultaneously released in roughly 25 countries across the world. Apart from the Gulf, USA, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand are some of the countries where Bollywood makes considerable revenue. Bollywood films enjoy a same-day release in these countries.

Bollywood heavily loses revenue in Pakistan, Myanmar, Bangladesh and Burma where the movies are pirated as soon as the master prints reach those countries.

Recently Bollywood films have found a great box-office response in China has been fabulous where the Indian films have topped the charts as the most favourable foreign film in China.

However, like every apparently ‘generous’ strategy from China, there’s a secret strategy here which the Chinese president is not talking about.

By opening the door ajar to Bollywood, China will try to free its market from the chokehold of Hollywood movies. USA and China have never been great friends and Chinese state media has repeatedly attacked the “Hollywood Culture” in countless editorials.

So, as China wants to ward off Hollywood films from its markets, it has found an able ally in Bollywood. Using of Bollywood films to ward off Hollywood films is a unique strategy never ever seen anywhere across the world.

“Indian movie Secret Superstar topped the imported movies at the Chinese box office with 746 million yuan ($118 million ). However, it didn’t achieve the success of a predecessor, Dangal, which took 1.29 billion yuan ($200 million ) in 2017,” a state media report said, talking about how Bollywood films have lately enjoyed a golden run in China.

In this May 22, 2017 photo, a group of Chinese women take a selfie with a poster of Indian Bollywood blockbuster film “Dangal” on display at a cinema in Beijing. The Aamir Khan film has become China’s biggest grossing non-Hollywood foreign movie. The Indian film was released in China on May 5. By Tuesday, the Indian film had pulled in 806 million yuan ($117 million) in mainland China, according to data from EntGroup, a leading entertainment consultant. (AP Photo/Andy Wong)

The last Bollywood film to rake in the moolah is Irrfan Khan’s ‘Hindi Medium’ which has collected as much as Rs 200 Crore (approx) in China.

Bollywood films gel better with the Chinese culture, according to the Chinese.

“The stories in the Indian films are like the stories in China, stories the Chinese relate to. The Chinese audience could identify with them,” said Tan Zheng , editor of Diangying Yishu (Film Art) magazine.

The first indication that Bollywood is going to play a big role in the India-China Summit was when Modi and Xi were seen enjoying an instrumental rendition of 1982 Bollywood superhit song ‘Tu, tu hai wahi dil ne jise apna kaha,’ from movie ‘Yeh Vaada Raha’ by Chinese artists on the first day of the Modi-Xi informal summit.

Here’s the video:

Later when at the reporter’s meet, it was announced that indeed steps are being taken to release Bollywood movies in China in a major. It also revealed something about the Chinese president that the world had never known — that he is a big fan of Bollywood movies.

Briefing reporters at the end of the two-day informal summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi in the central Chinese city, Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale said: “President Xi said that he had seen a number of Indian films, both Bollywood and regional, and that it would be a good idea that more Indian films come to China and more Chinese films go to India,” Gokhale said.

Gokhale confirmed that Prime Minister Modi has responded to the oral proposal of Xi and Bollywood films feature prominently in the list of proposals that India has submitted to China during the Summit.

“The proposals forwarded by Prime Minister Narendra Modi included moving ahead to find ways to collaborate in terms of entertainment including films. It would be a good idea to expand this. More Indian films should come to China and vice versa,” Mr Gokhale added.

There is an effort going on to appoint Aamir Khan as the Bollywood brand ambassador to China. The same has support from the Chinese authorities as per Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying. The deal is currently at the talks level and Aamir Khan is understood to be involved in the process.