China Box Office: ‘Alien: Romulus’ Reaches Milestone

A handful of holdover confirmed their resilience on what was otherwise a deathly quiet weekend at the mainland China box office.

Chinese crime actioner, “Go for Broke” (aka “Chong Sheng”) earned RMB35.4 million ($5.0 million) between Friday and Sunday, according to data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway. That lifted it to first place in its fourth weekend of release and gives it a cumulative of $53.4 million.

“Alien Romulus,” which had topped the chart for the previous three weeks, fell to second place. It earned $4.5 million and became only the second Hollywood import title this year to earn more than $100 million in Chinese theaters (Behind “Godzilla x Kong”).

“How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies,” the Thai-produced comedy drama, saw its week-on-week takings decline, but its chart rank improve. The film earned RMB18 million ($2.5 million) in third place, compared with $3.3 million and fifth place a week earlier. Since releasing in China on Aug. 23, it has accumulated RMB105 million ($14.8 million).

“Successor,” a heartwarming Chinese drama film that topped the box office for five weeks, clung on to fourth spot in its ninth week of release. It earned RMB17.6 million ($2.4 million) for a cumulative of $464 million since arriving in cinemas on July 16.

Chinese crime drama, “Untouchable” earned $1.7 million in its third weekend of release. Directed by Wang Daqing and starring Shen Teng, Zhang Yuqi and Jack Kao, it has a running total of $23.2 million since opening on Aug. 23.

The latest weekend’s nationwide aggregate was a pitiful $24.4 million, the second lowest weekend of 2024. While seasonality is clearly a factor — September is often a quiet month at the Chinese box office as the summer season wanes and distributors hold their more commercial titles for release around the Oct. 1 or National Day public holidays – the downtrend is nevertheless steep.

Artisan Gateway calculates that the year-to-date total is $4.75 billion, or more than 22% below the same point last year. It reported that August box office was worth $568 million, a 48% decrease year-over-year, but still the third highest month of 2024. The summer season (calculated as June 1-Aug. 31) was worth RMB11.6 billion ($1.6 billion) was the worst for ten years, excluding the three COVID years of 2020-2022.

The paucity of new releases was evident. Local sources credit Thai-Chinese-produced animation “Out of the Nest,” with $250,000, as the highest-placed new film.