好萊塢為何屈膝逢迎中國？◎BBC（2013.03.12）

好萊塢為何屈膝逢迎中國？◎BBC（2013.03.12）

【Comment】
台灣稱為《紅朝入侵》

以下摘自wiki：

實際上由於中國電影市場對國外電影引進實行嚴格的准入審查，本片的題材即使經過修改也沒有在中國市場發行的可能性，製作方的這一修改更多是為避免刺激中國政府及其電影審查部門，影響其旗下其他產品在中國市場的發行。

社會輿論

《紐約時報》認為該片對中國「政治歸化」。^[3]

《華盛頓時報》認為該片為票房「提前向中國投降」，並且分析了中國和朝鮮的各方面實力，指出朝鮮人口2400萬，飛彈空中解體，首都平壤還經常停電，除了可以投放兵力到韓國，其他地方都不行。^[3]

《獨立報》：「這就像被邀請參加一個派對，但整夜你都在侮辱主人。這不可能好看。」^[3]

《大西洋月刊》：「中國沒理由攻擊最重要的貿易夥伴美國。即便中國想攻擊，其軍力也不夠強。即便軍力夠強，一些分析家說，中國內部問題太多，無暇攻擊美國。」^[3]

《金融時報》：「好萊塢的董事們不斷向中國鞠躬，中國已成為好萊塢電影無形的審查官。」^[3]

《法蘭克福彙報》：「中國人越來越自信，好萊塢電影也要中國化。」^[3]

《新聞報》：「中國的審查讓好萊塢戰戰兢兢。」^[3]

 

 

英媒：好萊塢為何屈膝逢迎中國？◎BBC（2013.03.12）
http://www.bbc.co.uk/zhongwen/trad/press_review/2013/03/130312_press_hollywood.shtml

《衛報》網絡版周二（12日）刊登一篇文章說，好萊塢越來越討好中國，甚至不惜主動逢迎中國的審查制度。

文章開篇就舉本周將在倫敦放映的新版《赤色黎明》為例說，米高梅公司在2009年翻拍這部在1984年轟動一時的冷戰驚險片時，決定把原來入侵美國的蘇聯改成中國。

米高梅認為，冷戰之後的世界，只有中國才可能使美國膽戰，所以在翻拍片的劇情中，設計了中國要「收復」欠下中國巨額債款的美國的情節，當然，最後入侵的中國人民解放軍被美國軍民奮起擊敗。

解放軍改成人民軍

但是劇情腳本的一部分在2010年被洩漏，引發了中國的激烈反應，有1千5百萬銷售量的中國官媒《環球時報》用「美國重拍冷戰影片妖魔化中國」作頭版頭條的標題；投資者也對米高梅公司說，《赤色黎明》不會在中國有市場。

儘管影片的拍攝已經完成，但米高梅還是在後期製作時花了一百萬美元，用數碼技術刪除了片中的中國國旗和標誌，改變了故事情節和對話，把中國人民解放軍改成朝鮮人民軍。

文章說，好萊塢用過去從未對蘇聯用過的態度來討好中國，因為中國與前蘇聯不同，中國越來越多的影迷已經使它成為美國電影的第二大海外市場，而根據安永會計事務所的最新統計，中國在2020年將超過美國，成為世界上電影觀眾最多的國家。

但是對於電影製作者來說，這並不一定是個好消息，中國不僅對外國電影的進口有配額，而且還有嚴格的審查制度。迪斯尼、索尼和米高梅公司以前都曾因製作《達賴喇嘛的一生》、《七年在西藏》和《紅角落》等批評北京政府的影片而被禁止進入中國。

現在那些可能招致北京政府不滿的批評通常都被消滅在萌芽中，比如電影《加勒比海盜：世界盡頭》中的光頭中國海盜、《黑衣人3》中偽裝成中國飯店打工仔的外星人、《天降殺機》中英國特工殺死中國保安的鏡頭，全都被中國的電影審查機構刪除。

主動逢迎

另一些好萊塢電影製作者則選擇了主動逢迎中國審查者的口味，比如《環形使者》的大部分場景就從巴黎移到上海；《超級戰艦》是在香港擊敗了攻擊地球的外星人；而2010年重拍的《功夫夢》中的主角一家甚至從美國底特律移民到北京，尋求更好的生活，而日本的空手道也變成了中國的功夫。

與中國合作拍攝的《環形使者》和《功夫夢》都得到很好的回報，在中國搶手的黃金周假期時上映；而美國大片《蝙蝠俠》和《神奇的蜘蛛俠》則被迫兩部電影在同一時間上映，以免影響中國影片的上座率。

好萊塢的老影人對這些表示擔憂，《洛杉磯時報》引述一名因為不願得罪同事而希望匿名的資深電影從業者的話說，這明顯顯示了好萊塢正在前所未有的討好一個有政治審查制度的外國政府，這對美國的電影製作起到深刻影響。

文章說，越來越多人抱怨，美國和其它一些國家正在給中國一個美好的形像，但對中國的社會不公正、違反人權和帝國主義野心，卻小心翼翼的避而不談。

 

 

Why Hollywood kowtows to China◎the Guardian（2013.03.12）
http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2013/mar/11/hollywood-kowtows-to-china?INTCMP=SRCH

Last week North Korea threatened America with a nuclear strike.  This week sees the UK release of Red Dawn, which features a North Korean invasion of the US.  An impressive instance of Hollywood's far-sightedness?  Not quite.

Red Dawn is the reboot of a cold war thriller that's much cherished in some quarters.  Back in 1984, when the original appeared, the aggressor could only have been the Soviet Union.  With the new film comes a new commie bogeyman – but it was not supposed to be North Korea.  These days, it's not so much Kim Jong-un's eccentric dictatorship that makes Americans tremble, it's their newfound rival for superpower status, China.

So, MGM's re-imaginers decided to reallocate Russia's role to the Chinese People's Republic.  Fancifully enough, they envisaged Beijing "repossessing" an America that had defaulted on its huge Sino debt.  However, this storyline didn't go down well in China.  When excerpts of the script leaked out in 2010, they prompted the headline "US reshoots cold war movie to demonise China" in the Beijing-based, 1.5m-circulation Global Times.  Buyers told MGM that distributing Red Dawn in China would prove problematic.  So the studio decided on a change of tack.

Unfortunately, the film had already been shot.  No matter.  During post-production, $1m was spent on digitally erasing Chinese flags and symbols and changing sequences and dialogue to turn the invaders into North Koreans.  Of course, Hollywood would never have dreamed of bowing like this to Soviet displeasure, but China is different.

The world's most populous nation has become the second-largest overseas market for American films.  Its increasingly avid cinemagoers can easily add $50m to a Hollywood movie's gross.  The number of screens in the country, already more than 11,000, is expected to double by 2015.  In a recent report, Ernst & Young predicted that China's box office would overtake America's by 2020.

Sadly for movie-makers, this burgeoning treasure trove is guarded by a censorious state.  China's government imposes a quota on film imports and keeps a careful eye on the content of those it allows through.  Back in the 90s, Disney, Sony and MGM all had their Chinese business blocked after releasing the movies Kundun, Seven Years in Tibet and Red Corner, all of which were deemed critical of the regime.

Nowadays, any such potential transgressions are usually nipped in the bud.  When censors objected to a bald Chinese pirate in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, he was edited out of the film's Chinese version.  Footage was similarly removed from Men in Black 3 because unpleasant aliens had dared disguise themselves as Chinese restaurant workers.  In the Chinese version of Skyfall, references to prostitution and corruption in China were removed or obscured in opaque subtitles.  All mention of the torture inflicted on Javier Bardem's villain when he was an MI6 agent in Hong Kong was carefully expunged.

Accommodations like these are not enough for some film-makers, who opt instead for proactive ingratiation.  The setting of large sections of Looper was transferred from Paris to Shanghai.  In Battleship, it's Hong Kong that is credited by Washington with divining the alien origins of the earth's attackers.  The 2010 remake of The Karate Kid saw the young hero's family turned into importunate migrants leaving decaying Detroit to seek a better future in thriving Beijing.  In spite of the film's title, the all-conquering martial art becomes kung fu instead of karate, and the fount of all skill, wisdom and fortitude is an altogether Chinese kung fu master.

It seems to pay off.  Looper, like The Karate Kid a co-production with a Chinese partner, was gifted a much sought-after Golden Week holiday release; all-American blockbusters such as The Amazing Spider-Man and The Dark Knight Rises are often forced to play against each other to stop them squeezing out indigenous productions.  Audiences, as well as the authorities, seem to appreciate a Hollywood kowtow.  In disaster epic 2012, a White House staffer lavishes praise on Chinese scientists when an ark they've designed saves civilisation.  At this point in the proceedings, filmgoers sometimes rose to deliver a spontaneous standing ovation.

Among Hollywood's old guard, all this has provoked a certain amount of disquiet.  A producer, anonymous for fear of offending his industry's new masters, was quoted by the Los Angeles Times as complaining: "It's a clear-cut case – maybe the first I can think of in the history of Hollywood – where a foreign country's censorship board deeply affects what we produce."

There have been complaints that both America and the rest of the world are being given an unduly rosy portrait of a repressive behemoth.  China's social injustices, human rights abuses and imperial aspirations are, it's suggested, being discreetly veiled from view.

Still, what's happened with Red Dawn isn't exactly unprecedented. During the first world war, Cecil B DeMille made a film called The Cheat with a Japanese villain.  In 1923 the film was reissued, but by then Japan had become an American ally.  Without benefit of digital technology, the wily oriental was quickly turned into a Burmese ivory king.

If Hollywood now finds itself cheerleading for an assertive superpower, that isn't new either.  For almost a century, Tinseltown buttressed America's own hegemony by puffing up the American way to sell more movie tickets on the home front.  If economic success is winning communist China a piece of that pie, well, put that down to capitalism's market forces.