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PEOPLE & ARTS A29
                                                                                                                        Wednesday 8 March 2017

Jackie Chan: Hollywood competition

means better China films 

LOUISE WATT                   and the U.S. are expected       percent. They receive 40       Hong Kong movie star Jackie Chan, delegate to the Chinese
Associated Press              to reach a new agree-           percent of ticket revenues     People’s Political Consultative Conference gestures as he
BEIJING (AP) — Jackie         ment this year on how           in other markets.              speaks at a press conference on the sideline of the CPPCC at
Chan says letting more        many foreign films to allow     It’s unclear how much          the media center in Beijing, Tuesday, March 7, 2017.
Hollywood movies into the     into China, now the world’s     effort President Donald
Chinese market would          the second-biggest movie        Trump’s administration will                                                                        Associated Press
pressure Chinese filmmak-     market after North Amer-        put into promoting Holly-
ers to make better films.     ica. An expanded quota          wood’s interests in China.
China sets a quota on the     would mean more com-            Trump has been criticized
number of foreign mov-        petition for domestic films,    by various Hollywood stars
ies allowed to be shown in    which last year accounted       and fired off his own insults
the country, trying to fend   for 58 percent of the total     at others.q
off a cinematic wave that     box office, or 26.7 billion
could swamp local film-       yuan ($3.8 billion).
makers and loosen the rul-    In 2012, then-Vice Presi-
ing Communist Party’s grip    dent Xi Jinping and then-
on culture.                   U.S. Vice President Joe
However, competition can      Biden negotiated a five-
be good, Chan said.           year deal to allow 34 for-
“It is this pressure that     eign films to be shown in
makes our filmmakers work     Chinese cinemas each
harder and shoot better       year on a revenue-sharing
films,” Chan told report-     basis. State media reports
ers at a news conference      have suggested that a
in Beijing on Tuesday. “If    new deal could see the
we had shot our own films     quota increased by 10 films
behind closed doors with-     or more.
out any competition, we       In addition to the quota, a
wouldn’t have had the         handful of extra Hollywood
growth in box office we       movies were let in last year
have today.”                  to try to boost a disappoint-
The Hong Kong action star     ing slowdown in box office
is a member of the official   receipts.
advisory body to the na-      Apart from expanding
tional legislature, which is  the quota, Hollywood ex-
meeting this week in the      ecutives hope to increase
Chinese capital.              their share of ticket sales in
Negotiators from China        China from the current 25
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