Hopes for another record year at the domestic box office are fizzling fast, but numbers out of China continue to dazzle.
First half box office in China grew 22 percent to $2.16 billion with American movies accounting for more than half of that figure, Artisan Gateway, a China-based consulting firm reported Tuesday.
The domestic market is off 1.4 percent year-to-date from 2013 and 3.5 percent lower than 2012, according to Boxofficemojo.com,
Imax CEO Richard Gelfond said that the firm has been breaking box office records in China by 10 percent to 20 percent in recent years but this past weekend’s “Transformers: Age of Extinction,” from Paramount broke Imax records by 100 percent.
The movie took in nearly $100 million with around 600 Imax screens drawing $10 million over the three-day weekend and another $2 million on Monday, Gelfond said. The previous record was “Godzilla” which was a $4.5 million weekend in May.
Meanwhile Rentrak’s senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian told The Post that China is forecast to pass the US as the largest film market in the world by 2018.
China filmgoers spent $3.6 billion in 2013, according to Rentrak data. “We’re seeing annual growth over the past 10 years of 30 percent in annual box office receipts,” said Dergarabedian. “You can’t ignore China if you’re in the movie business.”
Even so, one Hollywood insider told The Post that several studios are having a hard time translating boffo box office numbers into meaningful top line revenue. US-based studios get only 15 percent of the box office returns and even then they have to pay a host of agencies to allow them to distribute their movies.