When the curtain comes down on the year for Chinese cinema, among the main talking points will be two promising trends that emerged across 2025: A box office rebound and the expanding diversity of content that has helped the industry back on its feet.
At last report in state-sponsored media, the BO for the year — around $5.98 billion — has already topped 2024. Not exactly back to pre-pandemic levels of around $9.2 billion, but a sign that recovery is well underway. The main driver of that recovery has been the global animated hit about a little demon boy —Beijing Enlight Pictures’ Ne Zha 2 — which blew past Pixar’s Inside Out 2 with an estimated box office of more than $2.2 billion globally to become the biggest animated hit of all time. But if you dig a little further into the charts, you’ll find an assortment of productions that differ in both story and in style.
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The Shen Ao-directed Dead to Rights (China Film Group) is a case in point. After taking $381 million from the Chinese BO — and finding limited release across North America in August — it has been submitted as Chinese official international Oscar submission. The film takes a nuanced look at events in and surrounding the Nanjing Massacre in 1937 — when invading Japanese forces killed an estimated 300,000 people — that’s in contrast to the bombast of the majority of China’s historical epics
Shen and his team went through painstaking research into the real-life story at the film’s heart — how a photographer risked everything to keep record of the atrocity — and they were mindful of the needs of contemporary Chinese audiences, as well as the international audiences opening up to Chinese films.
“I believe today’s audiences no longer want to follow a single narrative or a lone hero, so we brought together characters from different walks of life — civil servants, businessmen, actors, housewives, soldiers, translators — and let their stories intertwine to create a complex, ensemble-driven narrative,” explains the director.
Dead to Rights is among a number of productions being showcased at the China Film Pavilion inside AFM this week. The third installment of the initiative — run by the China Film Co-Production Corporation (CFCC) under the guidance of the China Film Administration — has been showcasing 70 Chinese film companies and 200 of the country’s latest productions.
Among those featured have been the China Film Group Corporation, Bona Film Group, CMC Pictures, Lianray Pictures, China Film Archive, China Film Foundation and the Shanghai International Film Festival, while along with both Dead to Rights and Ne Zha 2, the spotlight has fallen on other titles, like Shenzhou 13, A Tapestry of a Legendary Land, The Shadow’s Edge, Nobody and Curious Tales of a Temple.
Other features of this year’s pavilion have included a promotion of Chinese locations and studios, along with a virtual reality interactive — or “experience zone” — designed to showcase how the Chinese industry is developing this evolving technology with previews of upcoming VR projects like Journey to the Center of the Earth and Mulan 2125. Organizers hope both initiatives will pave “new avenues for global cooperation.”
AMC Century City 15 has also been the host of a “China Film Promotion” that presented representatives from more than 30 companies and more than 30 films, while the University of Southern California also hosted a screening of Dead of Rights as well as the hit comedy The Adventure.
That Duo Ma-directed production puts a clever contemporary twist on the notion of time-travel, as a disgruntled middle-aged man swaps places with his teenage self — and then they communicate via instant messaging. Producer Zhang Xiaolei agrees with the notion that Chinese audiences are demanding more diversity in content — and studios are listening.
Zhang, whose film took in more than $23 million since its release on Aug. 8, believes the film “struck a nerve among those trapped in the grind of corporate life” while also probing the “confusion and regrets that mark contemporary family life.”
Chinese movies have gone from thinking “entertainment first” to “meaningful expression,” the producer says.
“The decision to blend comedy with more profound subject matter reflects [studio] Ultra Comedy’s guiding creative philosophy: ‘to make laughter warmer,’” says Zhang. “We’ve always believed in the unique emotional power of comedy and have been dedicated to exploring the human and social truths behind the laughter. To us, comedy should not be a fleeting source of amusement, but a vessel for emotion and reflection. In essence, this appetite for genre fusion speaks to a dual pursuit among audiences: richer content and deeper meaning.”
Shen and his team also looked towards a blend in genres when working out just how they could tackle such a sensitive part of Chinese history, opting for a documentary-style that, at times, adds a further edge to the drama as it unfolds.
“We deliberately cut back on graphic depictions of violence and instead used black-and-white photographs to convey the tragedy of the victims, symbolizing how the struggle between truth and falsehood, good and evil, is as stark and undeniable as black and white itself,” says the director. “The film isn’t just a lament for the victims; it’s also an indictment of those who sought to bury the truth.”
Shen — who’s acclaimed debut No More Bets (2023) tackled the issue of human trafficking across Asia — is now looking to explore his options with his next project.
“Clearly, animation has become one of the brightest areas of growth for Chinese cinema,” he says. “As a father, I’m personally inspired to make something my own child could watch — perhaps a hybrid of live action and animation, or even a fully animated feature. I’m also eager to develop series that can travel beyond China, connecting with global audiences and sharing Chinese stories and values through film and television.”
It’s a statement that’s in keeping with the main drive of this year’s China Film Pavilion — namely that the Chinese industry is expanding its horizons.
So the last word goes to a CFCC representative, who adds: “In the future, the pavilion will continue to widen international exchange and cooperation, supporting Chinese film companies and their works in becoming an integral part of global cinema.”
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