Hollywood won’t budge for Chinese censors anymore.

• Some of the most eagerly awaited films may never be released in China.
• Producers are less concerned about losing access to theatres around the world.
• Disney and Pixar were asked to remove a scene from their film Lightyear by Chinese censors.

Hollywood has long gone above and beyond to satisfy Chinese censors. no longer.

Producers of some of the hottest US blockbusters over the past year have kept in scenes that would irritate China’s censors, seemingly less concerned about the possibility of losing access to theatres around the nation of 1.4 billion people.

Because of this, some of the most eagerly awaited films to be released recently, such as “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” and “Lightyear,” have not yet and may never reach the second-largest box office in the world.

In China, authorities must approve each public screening of a film. Censorship is rampant, with authorities progressively cracking down on content they deem offensive, including in certain cases the display of cleavage, tattoos, individuals smoking, and more overtly political content.

Consider the brand-new “Top Gun” sequel, which is currently the year’s top film. According to the Wall Street Journal, a Chinese supporter reportedly pushed producers to remove Taiwan’s flag from a 2019 trailer for the film. Later, once Tencent (TCEHY), the investor, purportedly withdrew, the insignia was restored to Tom Cruise’s renowned bomber jacket.

Relations between China and Taiwan are complicated. Despite never having had control over it, Beijing’s Communist leadership has long claimed Taiwan, a self-governing democratic island, as a part of its territory.

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An unidentified source told the Journal in May that officials at the movie’s studio, Paramount (PGRE), no longer anticipate a release in mainland China.

The action was then met with another rejection from Disney (DIS) and Pixar, who were reportedly asked to remove a brief, same-sex kissing sequence from their most recent animated film, “Lightyear,” by authorities in nations including China. Images of homosexuality have long been strictly prohibited in China.

Galyn Susman, the film’s producer, told Reuters that Disney declined to make the cut and that she thought the movie wouldn’t debut in the nation. The film, starring Chris Evans as the titular space ranger Buzz Lightyear, had its international premiere last month.

According to a source with knowledge of the situation, Disney has submitted the movie for release in mainland China and is currently waiting for a formal answer.

When Chinese censors requested that the Statue of Liberty be removed or reduced in size from a sequence in “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” Sony (SNE) Pictures likewise found itself in a difficult situation around the end of the previous year, according to the magazine Puck. According to reports, the studio declined, and the film was never screened in theatres on the mainland.

A request for comment was not answered by Sony, Disney, or Paramount, and they all declined. An inquiry for comments was not answered by China’s film regulators.

Why therefore would these businesses resist, risking tens or hundreds of millions of dollars? Veteran members of the industry point out that the Chinese cinema market isn’t what it once was.

According to analysts, movie companies have started to reevaluate the trade-off involved with satisfying Chinese censors in recent months, particularly as the nation’s box office gets more secluded, more strictly regulated, and continues to be hammered by Covid-19 limitations.

According to Chris Fenton, former president of DMG Entertainment and author of the book “Feeding the Dragon: Inside the Trillion-Dollar Dilemma Facing Hollywood, the NBA, and American Business,” “There is 100 percent a shift” in how Hollywood views Chinese censors.

According to him, pleasing Beijing no longer ensures high profits in China, according to CNN Business. Such risk and effort no longer ensure success, and I anticipate that this lack of assurance will keep the pushback era going for a while.

Uncertain history

Robert Cain, the founder of Pacific Bridge Pictures, which aids Chinese and foreign partners in creating entertainment ventures, remarked, “It’s about darn time.”

According to Cain, who has conducted business in China and Hollywood for more than 20 years, Hollywood studios used to “kowtow to the Chinese government, doing anything and everything they could to make sure their pictures went in, including debasing their films and themselves.”

“You couldn’t locate a single studio executive who would say anything that could be interpreted as being negative of China… We’re in a new scenario now, and I believe the studios are feeling more confident to go their own way and fight back because they no longer view China as a golden goose.”

The challenges that filmmakers have faced are widely known.

The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a government body established to brief the US Congress, said in a 2015 study that “American filmmakers increasingly cut films with an eye on distribution in China in anticipation of Chinese censors’ various potential sensitivities”

One such instance was the remake of the action film “Red Dawn,” which, according to the commission, “underwent pricey digital modifications” to remove China’s villainous portrayal.

Erich Schwartzel, a film critic for The Wall Street Journal and the author of the book “Red Carpet,” revealed to CNN’s Jake Tapper that MGM invested $1 million in the change in 2012.

According to Aynne Kokas, an associate professor of media studies at the University of Virginia and the author of the book “Hollywood Made in China,” a Tibetan character in the movie “Doctor Strange” was purportedly remade as Celtic in 2016 to appease Chinese authorities.

One of the most delicate issues in Chinese politics is Tibet, which has been under the Communist regime’s rule since 1951.

Kokas also cited Warner Bros.’ choice this year to erase references to a lesbian relationship from the Chinese version of its most recent “Harry Potter” film. Warner Bros. Discovery, the same corporate parent as CNN, owns Warner Bros.

At the time, Warner Bros. said it was “dedicated to maintaining the integrity of every picture we distribute” in a statement to CNN Business.

The official continued, “A six-second edit was asked for and Warner Bros. approved those adjustments to meet with local restrictions, but the spirit of the film remains intact.

Such actions run a greater and greater danger of blowback in Western markets.

According to Fenton, there has been increased “scrutiny placed on Hollywood by politicians, journalists, critics, and even moviegoers in terms of anything regarded as bowing to Beijing,” and she implied that this scrutiny may ultimately result in “lost revenue globally.”

The “SCREEN Act,” which mandates that Hollywood studios “give written agreements stating they will not modify their own films at the request of censorship from the Chinese Communist Party,” is one of the bills that have been filed in the US Congress.

According to Kokas, requests like the one to take the Statue of Liberty out of “Spider-Man” have put studios on an unpleasant tightrope.

There is no certainty that producers would be able to increase their profits, and doing so could hurt their US market, she added. In a very divisive political climate like the one in the US, taking down the Statue of Liberty can potentially harm your movie.

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