Preface:

Since the 1920s, Hollywood has been dominating the film industry and in most cases, it is not unusual to find someone who has not watched a film that is produced by his own country. Thus, national films, especially those from the Asian region suffer as Hollywood films draw away their audiences.

In recent years however, there has been a rapid surge in international recognition of Asian films. Though this is partly due to them being more readily available on video and DVD, films from Asia are also increasingly winning top prizes at highly respected film festivals across the globe. As an Asian myself, I feel a strong connection to the current state that Asian film industry is in and the need to focus on Asia because of its potential growth in the global film industry.

With that being said, the primary focus of this study is to investigate the chances of Asian cinema ending Hollywood’s strong and lasting dominance in the world film market, and eventually achieving an equal status as Hollywood across the globe in the coming years. In this study, I will attempt to explore the standings of a few representatives of Asian cinema against the industry bully, Hollywood.

Introduction

Often considered as one of the youngest art forms, the motion picture industry is just over a century old with majority of its existence dominated by Hollywood.

“Hollywood films account for about 80 percent of the global market, American TV products occupy about 90 percent of worldwide airtime, American music makes about 85 percent of the profits in the music business: such a situation should be regarded as dramatic for the whole of mankind!’’ said executive director of the Korean Coalition Yang Gi-hwan (Bertolin, 2006, para. 8).

Despite occasional successes attained by non-Hollywood films within their own native countries as well as overseas, films produced by Hollywood ultimately dominates the international box office. Such a trend can be traced back to the 1920s, during which Hollywood and the studio system that it created came to dominate the movie industry across the globe (Ross, 2002, p. 68).

With its huge domestic base and its formal creation of a cartel, the major Hollywood studios began their worldwide film domination in full-fledged integrated fashion, producing, distributing and exhibiting natively and abroad. Its star system, publicity machinery and prestigious grand cinemas were placed into action and further expanded with the high returns flowing to the cartel. In simpler terms, it was a business strategy meant for a loaded cartel, forced into cinemas across the globe, which led to more profits and an even greater control over the world film market. Using its generous budgets to its advantage, Hollywood further made it impossible for other nations to compete on the same level (Segrave, 1997, p. 281). Today, the average cost that Hollywood sets aside for a film is $100 million (Jon, 2008, para. 2).

In most Asian countries, their national films suffer while Hollywood films continue to draw in more audience. In fact, Hollywood accounts for an astonishingly high percentage of the box office in several of its Asian counterparts – 96% in Taiwan, 78% in Thailand and 65% in Japan (Lee, 2005, para. 5).

It is then no surprise that the worldwide film revenue for Hollywood has soared from $34.9 billion in 2007 to an estimated $41.6 billion by the end of 2011 (Business Wire, 2008, para. 3). But even with such great success, Hollywood continues to fight even harder to maintain and expand their worldwide film domination by complaining of discrimination and lack of access to Hollywood products in countries where it has long controlled 80% or more of the screen time. (Segrave, 1997, p. 281). Along its path to worldwide domination, the Hollywood juggernaut has destroyed the glory of many local film industries like the Philippines and Singapore, while it continues to thrive in its success.

The Three Musketeers: Asian Cinema’s Hope

While there is no denying that this pattern of box office domination is evident in majority of the Asian film markets, there are exceptions. Paul Willemen, a professor of Critical Studies, reveals that “some countries (especially in Asia) have managed to prevent Hollywood from destroying their local film industry”. These countries worth noting are India, Hong Kong, and South Korea.

Located in South Asia, India’s motion industry continues to flourish as both Bollywood films and regional films dominate their nation’s box office, leaving no room for Hollywood films to penetrate through. Here, Hollywood fare accounts for a mere 8% in the world’s second most populous nation (Khanna, n.d., para. 15). A similar picture can be seen in South Korea whereby homegrown films of Hollywood standards receive a fair share of the box office with Hollywood. Finally, another exception who has escaped from the tyrant’s clutches is Hong Kong where films from the bully have failed to make an impact on the local film consumption. In fact, its national films outsell Hollywood’s by a factor of four to one (Williams, 2002, p. 35). Besides its formidable defence, Hong Kong has also exercised its own dominance within its region, filling up cinemas and video shelves of its neighboring audience like Singapore, Malaysia and Taiwan (Cinema of Hong Kong, 2010).

India

Often considered by many to be the heart of the Indian motion picture industry, India is the world’s largest motion picture producing country, churning out nearly 1000 films annually and receiving positive receptions in Indian and in its neighboring nations. Even though the format of Bollywood films has undergone several changes over the years, the movies are typically melodramatic, 3-4 hours long, full of music and dance numbers, intensified with elaborate and brightly colored costumes and sets, and essentially revolve around traditional values such as family and religion. Amongst all these is usually a love story, where lovers overcome hardships in order to be together. But what makes the Bollywood films truly unique is the fact that most of them are musicals.

Indian film producer and director Bobby Bedi said that, “We are very optimistic that within the next five years a Bollywood movie will match the success of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon in the global market.” Much like the Indian economy, the Indian film industry is also globalizing. As a matter of fact, the motion picture of India has prided itself as being the largest film industry in the world. As mentioned previously, India produces on average a 1000 films a year, compared to a relatively modest 600 films produced by the US. This figure, however, does not translate into an equally proportional figure in terms of revenue. In 2006, the seemingly high revenue of $2.1 billion brought in by the Indian film industry sadly matches up to what takes only 4 Hollywood films to generate. As for why there was a low income turnover, two factors contributed to the growth of it. Firstly, tickets in India were made as affordable as they could be for everyone to enjoy a movie. In fact, the price of a ticket is considered a lot way cheaper when compared to other countries. Secondly, growth in piracy has also prevented the filmmakers to earn their desired income from the home video market.

Hence, for Indian filmmakers, distributing their films abroad seems like a lucrative route to take as going global provides a promising opportunity to rake in greater sales, higher profit margins and much added visibility. Additionally factors like changing content, international avenues for financing, increased star power, and the popularity of satellite as well as other distribution channels has further induce India to enter globalization.

While the route to globalization seems attractive, it does not come without its own set of problems. The evolving nature of globalization for Indian cinema also carried its own set of business implications. Indian filmmakers wonder if the future generations would one day flock to watch a Bollywood release as regularly as a Hollywood blockbuster while studio executives considers the big threats that Indian films pose to Hollywood. As these thoughts continue, one thing was certain: both Bollywood and Hollywood have no intention of destroying each other’s markets and losing the millions of audience they have garnered around the world in the process. Instead, both are tightening their film ties through film collaborations like Slumdog Millionaire and Kites and are becoming highly vested in each other’s markets (Lakshmi, 2009). With the hopeful mindset of “Bollywood versus Hollywood” now out of the way, we take a look at Hong Kong’s cinema.

Hong Kong

One can draw considerable satisfaction from the achievements of Hong Kong cinema and the influence it have had on filmmaking around the world. Be it film stars or directors, names such as Jackie Chan, Jet Lee, and John Woo have become household names headlining several blockbusters, including those from Hollywood. Along its path of success tag along numerous Western filmmakers who are exploring and employing the visual dynamics of Hong Kong movies, fusing their own film styles with hyperkinetic martial arts action, “wire-fu”, and graceful gun battles to the mainstream audiences through films like The Matrix and Kill Bill.

However, despite attaining such accomplishment overseas, the luster on Hong Kong’s native motion picture industry has faded quite drastically as the Hong Kong film industry is met with crisis. Within the homegrown market, Hong Kong’s market share has reduced significantly by 40% with a decrease in box office earnings as well. As mentioned previously, Hong Kong is one of the countries that managed to thrive in the face of Hollywood dominance. This, however, no longer stands true as its famous predominance in the homegrown market has been increasingly diluted with Hollywood products. For the first time in nearly 30 years, the Hong Kong cinema has given way to its western counterpart who managed to gain a secure foothold in its market. Such phenomenon can be first observed in 1993 when Jurassic Park became the highest grossing film of all time in the Hong Kong box office (Teo, 1997, p. 253).

The downfall of Hong Kong’s film industry has been due to a number of reasons even though the biggest culprit to blame is the handover of Hong Kong by the British back to the People’s Republic of China, which brought with it its own set of problems for the film industry, not least among them stricter censorship (Carter, 2007, p. 61-62). Spurred by the uncertainty that aroused during the handover back to Mainland China in 1997, the best and brightest players have also jumped on the bandwagon as these valuable human resources have been drawn into the bright lights of Hollywood, resulting in a considerable “brain drain” in Hong Kong’s film industry (Yoon, 2006, p. 63). Adding on to this loss is the deaths of two of its most popular performers: Leslie Cheung and Anita Mui.

Similar to India, Hong Kong’s industry is also threatened by the widespread of piracy, which puts films out onto the streets at a fraction of a cost of a movie ticket as they get released into theaters (Leong, 2002, p. 1). Year 2003 proved to be particularly disastrous for the industry. In addition to the already prominent economic woes, the SARS outbreak made people even more reluctant and afraid to go cinema. Film productions also came to a halt for 4 months. In fact, only 54 films were made that year. Efforts made by the government to promote investment in films by banks have also been futile as banks still see films as a high risk investment (Carter, 2007, p. 62). Moreover, the “shoot fast and cheap” mentality of Hong Kong’s film industry has not helped either, with studios producing bad quality and disposable offerings.

Indeed, there are films that have helped to brighten up Hong Kong’s current film industry, such as the recent success of Stephen Chow’s Kung Fu Hustle and Johnnie To’s Election (Cinema of Hong Kong, 2010). But on a wider scope, the magic of the so-called “Hong Kong New Wave”, Hong Kong’s golden era, is all but gone.

South Korea
Just as all hopes seem lost for Asian cinema when two of its biggest players, India and Hong Kong, have been removed from the façade of Hollywood’s domination, South Korea’s film industry has been gradually climbing its way up into success. Accustomed to fighting for survival, South Korea seems like Asia’s only hope in propelling Asian cinema to greater heights, thus bringing Asia’s glory back in the process. When that day comes, only then will Asian people be able to rejoice as the sun rises from the East again.

Over the last decade, the motion picture industry of South Korea has transformed remarkably. Since the 1970s, the native motion picture industry of South Korea was already considered quite strong, even though Hollywood films dominated 80% of the market until recently whereby South Korea’s national films have increased their stakes to slightly over 50% of the film market. Though not dominant, this figure is definitely considered far greater than what most Asian countries could occupy combined (Yoon, 2006, p. 63 – 65).

The roots of Korean cinema, the melodramas and exploitation films have given rise to a new generation of filmmakers. Educated aboard and heavily influenced by the contemporaries across the globe, this new wave of Korean filmmakers is molding the industry with daring art films, big budget action flicks, thought provoking dramas and subversive satires. In some places, South Korean is speculated to being the next new “Hong Kong” and even the “Hollywood of the East” with its indigenous film industry on the verge of propelling onto the world stage (Leong, 2002, p. 1-2). Indeed, this is strikingly similar to the “Hong Kong New Wave” that managed to launch Hong Kong and its groundbreaking directors into international spotlight and recognition in the past. In fact, some Korean films like Shiri have already found success in the world market, including its rival’s market through limited release. The filmmakers behind the success of the films are also being wooed by Hollywood studios for lucrative remake rights, such as the recent deals for Joint Security Area and My Sassy Girl (Cinema of Korea, 2010).

Part of the reason behind the success is because of the vast improvements in quality as well as quantity recently. A wide range of genres has also been developed to cater to the masses. The size of investment placed on its national films has also dramatically increased. Also, the industry structure is undergoing reorganization as it arms itself for globalization (Yoon, 2006, p. 65).

Over the course of reform, Korean filmmakers have closely followed the Hollywood model and it took only a while before the Korean film industry transformed its distribution and exhibition system to match that of Hollywood’s. South Korea used to have small scale locally owned cinemas and distributors. Today, that has evolved into two big distributors that control 70% of the local market, and 4 big multiplex owners that occupy most of the screens. The production system of South Korea is the last aspect that the film industry wants to change. In South Korea, directors are given autonomous control over creative decisions in film productions rather than the producers. Crew members and engineers are trained by masters and paid very little. Now, the film people are mobilized for restructuring by contending the adoption of Hollywood’s system. As a result, producers are getting more authority in film production. Additionally, Argent Web, which was just set up recently has a close partnership with CAA, one of Hollywood’s biggest agencies.

Today, the film industry of South Korea is actively involved in the course of globalization and it does so not only by exporting of films and human resources, but also the reformation of its native film industry. Its rival, Hollywood has been getting more interested in Korean films as they attain success natively and internationally (Yoon, 2006, p. 66).

With Hollywood continuously buying distribution and remake rights from Korean films, international recognition of Korean films is bound to rise in coming years. And as people around the world starts to open themselves up to Korean cinema, there will definitely be more export opportunities for the Korean film industry, which will in turn lead to greater international sales for filmmakers to leverage to ensure a smooth flow of returns on their products, thus promising a overall good condition of the Korean film industry.

Conclusion
There is almost no doubt that South Korea is following in both Hollywood’s and Hong Kong’s footsteps. However, one question remains and that is whether South Korea will be able to better Hong Kong and India in parts where they have failed by sustaining its native industry’s extraordinary growth through perseverance, innovation and emphasis on quality, or crash into the same walls that have befallen what were once Asia’s hope of standing up against the industry bully. Only time can tell.

Written by Jacky Yen Zi Shyun

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