After months of being ravaged by the Coronavirus, it seems like China’s fortunes may be starting to look up. Last week, nearly 5,000 cinemas opened for business in mainland China (with limited capacity for social distancing), all in regions deemed low-risk. China, whose cinemas had been shut down since mid-February due to Coronavirus safety concerns, attempted to reopen prematurely in late March. However, it seemed that optimism was misplaced, as only 500 were allowed to open and saw abominably low opening weekend returns due to the hesitancy of Chinese citizens in attending high-volume venues. Cinemas were quickly shuttered a week later and stayed that way until now. For some major cities such as Beijing, this is the 1st time in nearly six months that a majority of cinemas have been open to the public.
Reports from state media and lm companies tout this 2nd reopening, conversely, as much “faster than expected” claiming that box office returns have been much higher than analysts were tracking. Public and social support has surged, with China reopening other public venues such as shopping malls and restaurants over the past several months.
In their debut opening weekend, Hollywood titles reigned supreme, utterly trouncing homemade epics such as “Sleep Without A Shepherd” and “The Message”. Hollywood’s new releases such as “Dolittle” and Vin Diesel’s “Bloodshot” ranked highest amongst moviegoer choice, with re-releases of popular movies “Coco”, “Zootopia” and oddly “The Pursuit Of Happiness” also present.