BEIJING (AP) — Dazzling special effects, Optimus Prime ... and Beijing. The latest "Transformers" movie has all three, mixing Texas-based action with scenes in China's capital and a heavy dose of Hong Kong in an attempt to straddle the world's two biggest movie-going audiences.
The fourth installment of the Michael Bay-directed franchise has gone all-out to woo China's audience with Chinese locations, talent and even a reality TV show. "Transformers: Age of Extinction" illustrates the delicate balancing game of Hollywood studios trying to work out what the Chinese market wants while simultaneously catering to Americans.
If such films aren't handled properly, they risk alienating both audiences, said Michael Keane, an expert on China's creative industries at the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia. In China, the core movie-going group of 19-to-25-year-olds already like Western films, he said.
"They would like 'Transformers,' and as soon as you start stuffing in Chinese elements, they can see through it, and you may shoot yourself in the foot by doing it," Keane said.
Western studios are adding Chinese elements to increase their appeal in China, where films earned $3.6 billion in ticket sales last year. "Skyfall" was partly set in Shanghai and Macau. Chinese actress Fan Bingbing played one of the mutant superheroes in "X-Men: Day of Future Past," which has earned $114 million in China — almost a quarter of the movie's total international box office.
But the sprinkling of Chinese elements in "Transformers: Age of Extinction," opening in China and North America on Friday, has gone further than many recent Hollywood movies.
More than half an hour of its action takes place in Hong Kong and the crew filmed in three other Chinese cities. Chinese star Li Bingbing has a fairly major role and boy band singer-turned-actor Han Geng has a one-liner. A reality TV show was held a year before the movie's debut to choose four people to play roles.
In one scene a billboard stretches across most of the screen, advertising a Chinese liquor. In another product placement, Stanley Tucci's character takes a break on a roof and drinks from a carton of Chinese milk.
Online film critic Zheng Kunjie said the number of Chinese elements in the film was "unprecedented" in a Hollywood import. The familiar scenes and brands make the "Transformers" movie more realistic to a Chinese audience than one that employs a Western stereotype of "a classically beautiful China" like in "Skyfall," she said. While these will make Chinese moviegoers amused and interested in the film, the Chinese elements don't affect the development of the story, she said.
Florian Fettweis of Beijing-based media consultancy CMM-I said too many Chinese elements could dilute the appeal to U.S. movie-goers.
Western movies that have contained a more China-specific narrative have tended to fare badly at the box office, such as last year's directorial debut by Keanu Reeves, "Man of Tai Chi," set in Beijing and centering around Chinese martial arts.
Unlike the latest "Transformers" movie, "Man of Tai Chi" had official co-production status in China. To be classed as such by Chinese authorities, at least a third of their main creative talent must be Chinese, 30 percent of its film budget must come from China, some production must take place in China and the film must include a certain amount of undefined Chinese elements.