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Hollywood walk of CHINA.....December 12, 2007
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Suspicions in U.S. That China Has Put Ban on Hollywood Films
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By DAVID BARBOZA
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SHANGHAI — China has stopped granting permission for American films to be shown in its theaters in an apparent trade dispute with the United States, according to several Hollywood executives and United States government officials.
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The Chinese government has not announced any ban, but American movies are no longer being approved for release early next year, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
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The Chinese action, these officials said, might be in retaliation for the decision by the United States last April to file an intellectual property rights case with the World Trade Organization. The filing was meant to pressure China to enforce more strictly its intellectual property rights laws against the pirating of American movies and to give American companies greater access to the Chinese market.
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United States government officials said they had raised the issue of the ban or suspension of film approvals at high-level economic talks held in Beijing on Tuesday, but the officials did not say how China responded.
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According to the officials, Chinese leaders expressed strong displeasure with the decision to file the intellectual property rights case this year.
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The State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, which regulates China’s film industry, declined to comment. A spokeswoman at the agency’s Beijing office said by telephone that any ban would have been publicly announced.
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But Dan Glickman, chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America, said he was concerned about reports from Hollywood that American films were not being approved for showing in China.
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“There are strong indications that there is at least a stoppage of American films, that the approval process has been closed,” Mr. Glickman said in a telephone interview Tuesday. “I don’t have any confirmation that they have taken action. But if they have in fact established an official or unofficial block on our films that would be a strong step backwards.”
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China already limits the number of foreign films shown here to about 20 a year. Hollywood has been pressing for greater access to Chinese theaters. Films shown here must also pass Chinese censors and are often edited heavily.
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China may also be moving to protect its own film industry. Foreign films — mostly from the United States — typically account for nearly half of China’s box-office revenues, which topped $350 million in 2006.
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But Hollywood gets only a tiny slice of those revenues. In fact, China’s box office is meager when the global box office of more than $40 billion is considered.
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Still, Hollywood film studios say they believe that China will eventually be an important market. This year, the Hollywood movie “Transformers” was the top film at the Chinese box office.
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December is generally set aside for Chinese films, so there are few American films now being shown in China.
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Hollywood executives said they were worried about talking about any ban, which they say has been rumored in China for more than a month.
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In recent weeks, American movie industry officials say they have tried to submit films for approval for showing early next year and the films were either not accepted by regulators or the requests were ignored or delayed.
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“It’s not that they aren’t approving, you’re just not hearing anything from them,” one Hollywood executive said.
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Officials working for three of the biggest studios operating here, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Warner Brothers and Walt Disney, all declined to comment.
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The trade dispute over movies is just one among many now playing out between China and the United States, involving things like currency reform, food safety and China’s booming trade surplus.
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Among the worries in China is that the United States and the European Union may be moving toward protectionist measures to ease trade deficits.
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Intellectual property rights are also a leading area of dispute. Last April, the office of the United States trade representative filed a case against China with the W.T.O. concerning intellectual copyrights and market access. It covers authors and producers of books, music and movies.
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The largest and most prominent of those goods are American movies, which are popular in theaters in China but also available on counterfeit DVDs in most large cities, particularly those films that have never been released in China.
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This year, after the United States filed its intellectual property rights case, Chinese officials complained that the move would not help cooperation between the countries.
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Wang Ziqiang, a spokesman for China’s National Copyright Administration, said he did not deny that intellectual property rights infringement and piracy occurred in the Chinese market, “but that doesn’t mean the United States is founded to file complaints against China in the W.T.O.”
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