strategy+business^ issue^96124
try can attest, there’s always a learning curve. There are always things you didn’t
know, didn’t anticipate, and didn’t fully understand. When I spoke in Chang-
sha back in 2004, for example, I knew that China had a handful of filmmakers
who were turning out a few movies every year that were among the world’s most
imaginative, visually innovative, and emotionally satisfying films. But it wasn’t
until I began working in Beijing that I realized China was making hundreds of
TV shows and movies every year. Many of them, according to Chinese bloggers
quoted in Foreign Policy magazine, were derisively dismissed as leiren (“struck by
lightning”) for their absurd plots, over-the-top acting, and cheesy special effects
— and were subsequently dwarfed at the box office by slick, big-budget Holly-
wood titles such as Spider-Man, Transformers, Harry Potter, Pirates of the Carib-
bean, and Night at the Museum. (Even with the Chinese quota on “foreign” films,
ostensibly enacted to protect and encourage local filmmaking, those American
titles accounted for five of the 10 highest-grossing films in China in 2007, with
Transformers at number one. The annual quota rose from 20 films to 34 in 2012.)
Still, I discovered there were film schools and first-rate film studios across
the country. In fact, what was billed as the world’s largest film studio — Heng-
dian — took up an entire city not far from Shanghai. Opened in 1996, it had
standing sets for Asian street markets, European cities, a futuristic space-travel
landscape, and a near full-sized replica of Beijing’s ancient Forbidden City. Just
like what you’d find on the old backlots at Warner Bros., Paramount, or Fox, but
on a massive scale.
Some of the teething problems for our fledgling production company werefea
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