Chinese Film Beats Hollywood Blockbusters

Chinese-language films may no longer need to be protected against competition from Hollywood as they have been if weekend results at the Chinese box office are any indication. CRI, the state-run English-language news service, reports that over the seven-day Spring Festival Holiday, Hong Kong director Stephen Chow's Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons earned a record $67.73 million, far outpacing ticket sales of the U.S. overseas hit Cloud Atlas, which earned $10.3 million in its second week in China and has already earned more in that country than it did in North America. (Ironically, the film was strongly criticized in the U.S. for using Caucasian actors to play Asian characters.) On Thursday, Journey raked in $19.53 million, beating the previous single-day record of $17.73 million set by Transformers: Dark of the Moon in 2011.