'Flowers of War' dispute defused

BEIJING -- China's Film Bureau has intervened to resolve a potentially bitter dispute over the distribution revenue split on helmer Zhang Yimou's latest epic, the Christian Bale starrer "The Flowers of War." Pic, which is this year's official foreign language entry for China at the Academy Awards, is due to bow in China on Dec 16. The movie's distribs, Beijing New Pictures Film, Huaxia Film Distribution and China Film Group, had announced that the minimum price for a ticket would be hiked by five yuan (80 cents), and said distribs would get an increased take of 45% of profits, with the cinemas getting 55%. This marked a 2% hike in the take going to the distribs, at a time when cinemagoing has fallen by a similar amount. Fearful that cinemagoers would blame the hardtop operators, eight of the biggest China theater chains, including Beijing Film Distribution and Screening Association, Shanghai United Circuit and Zhejiang Time Cinema, rebelled and threatened to boycott the pic. "The average price for a film ticket in Beijing is 35 yuan ($5.50). According to what was announced by the distributors, the film's minimum price will be 40 yuan ($6.27). That's a record price," said Liu Hongpeng, vice-prexy of the Beijing Film Distribution and Screening Association, and the Shanghai United Circuit and Zhejiang Time Cinema chains. Zhang Yimou's long-time producer and partner Zhang Weiping said the price hike was justified because "Flowers" is 145 minutes long and it cost 600 million yuan ($94 million) to make, the most expensive Chinese film ever. "The cinemas have taken fewer risks than the investors in the film. There is nothing wrong with investors making more money than the cinemas," said Zhang. Biz figures described the stand-off as "like Armageddon." The Film Bureau, which is part of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television watchdog, stepped in to mediate. There will be no boycott of the movie, and the revised profit-sharing scheme will apply only to the first 500 million yuan ($78 million) the film makes at the box office, Liu said. "If box-office revenue exceeds 500 million yuan, cinemas will be allowed to take a greater percentage of the profits," Liu said. Pic, which deals with the "Rape of Nanking," the massacre that followed the invasion of China's wartime capital on Dec. 13, 1937, will be distributed in North America by Wrekin Hill Entertainment and Row 1 Entertainment. Contact the Variety newsroom at news@variety.com