BEIJING: The John Woo epic Red Cliff, dubbed the most expensive movie made in Asia, enjoyed record takings for a Chinese film in its opening weekend in China, the movie s distributor said.
The film, which depicts events in the ancient Three Kingdoms period, made 108 million yuan ($16 million) in mainland China in the four days after its debut last week, said China Film Group spokesman Weng Li.
It also took 27 million yuan on its first day, another record in China, according to Weng.
The box office takings beat other previous domestic blockbusters Curse of the Golden Flower, directed by Olympic opening ceremony mastermind Zhang Yimou, or Ang Lee s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Xinhua news agency said.
Red Cliff even beat the movie of the moment – animated film Kung Fu Panda – which only earned about 50 million yuan in ticket sales on its opening weekend, according to Xinhua.
But the two-part $80 million epic, starring Hong Kong star Tony Leung and Japan s Takeshi Kaneshiro, made headlines last month for very different reasons when a stuntman working on a battle scene died in a fire on set.
Woo, a Hong Kong film director and producer, rose to international prominence with Face Off starring John Travolta and Nicolas Cage in 1997.
He was also the director of Mission: Impossible II starring Tom Cruise. -AFP
