Ne Zha 2: The Chinese film breaking the box office
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Hello, it's Hannah Gelbart and you're listening to What In The World from the BBC World Service. Today we've got another treat for film fans. Yesterday we talked about Hollywood's biggest awards. Now we're diving into the world of Chinese animation. If I'm thinking about the best and the most successful animated films of all time, I'm probably going to go with The Lion King, Inside Out, Frozen, maybe even Shrek. But if I'm thinking about the best and the most successful animated films of all time,

But now it's all about Noja 2. Made by Beijing in light media, it's a Chinese animated fantasy about a boy's quest as he fights off demons with magical powers. And this film has stormed the Chinese box office. It's become the country's number one film of all time, and it was only released at the end of January. It

It has done so well in China that it has now become the highest-grossing animated film of all time globally, and it's in the top 10 biggest movies in history. I didn't even know this movie existed until I saw all over the internet just how much money it was making. So today, you're going to hear why this film has been such a hit and what it tells us about Chinese cinema.

I'm speaking to Kou Yu, a BBC journalist in Singapore who has been following the film's success. Hello. Hi, Hannah. So can you put this in perspective for us? Just how well has this film done? So this film has absolutely shattered China's box office records.

It reached the billion-dollar milestone in less than two weeks, and as we speak, it's now nearing $2 billion in revenue. It overtook Inside Out 2 last week. Before that, Inside Out was the highest-grossing animation film of all time, but now it's Nerja 2.

I guess it's important to also note that this movie, Nerja 2, didn't come out of nowhere. It comes as a sequel to Nerja 1. That movie, released in 2019, was a huge commercial success in its own right. At that time, it made over $700 million, which is pretty impressive. But now Nerja 2 has more than doubled that record. What is the appeal? What is Nerja 2 about?

Nezha 2 is about this boy who battles demons with his magical powers. Nezha as a character is based in Chinese mythology and

He would be a familiar character to people all across China and Chinese-speaking regions because of its prominence in mythology and also its feature in the popular Chinese historical novel. 99% of Nujatu's box office earnings are coming from China. Why do you think this is?

It's not really marketed at a global audience, I would say. It was released on 29 January for China's Lunar New Year holiday. It's the most important time for the Chinese box office, and this is when usually we'll have a slate of blockbusters hitting Chinese theatres. Nezha was among them, but since then it has towered over its competition. And even abroad, its target audience is the Chinese diaspora.

So the timing of its release is important. What else has contributed to it literally smashing, breaking all of these records? It was marketed as a very family-friendly movie for people to go watch and have a good time with their family, basically. It has performed so well at the box office that it has garnered global attention. And that, in result, has encouraged even more people in China to go and watch it as a sign of solidarity or out of curiosity to find out what is so good about this movie.

As you say, it's mainly been marketed towards a Chinese audience, the Chinese diaspora. It's got Chinese mythology and folklore. Is it fair to say it's become a bit of a nationalist symbol? Right. It's a symbol of general national pride, that's for sure. It is said to be the best country

animation, best quality animation that China has come up with so far. And it does show China's technological progress in animation to a point where, you know, we could put it beside Hollywood counterparts like Inside Out 2. But at the same time, it has indeed been latched onto by nationalists as a sort of litmus test for patriotism.

because of the amount of global tension it has gotten, it's the only Chinese film to have achieved such success in a field typically dominated by Hollywood movies. As a result, Chinese nationalists have seen this film as a target of determining whether someone is patriotic enough. On social media, people are sharing anecdotes of them

being accused of not loving their country enough just because they didn't watch the film or just because they have comments or criticisms about Neja too. What kind of criticism of the film has there been? So some viewers have pointed out that the movie's humour is quite cringey and there's also a lack of plot continuity. But, you know, these voices have quickly been met with a barrage of criticism

Criticisms are saying that they are being too nitpicky about the movie or that they are being paid to hate on the movie or trying to clout Chase just because the movie has gotten so much attention. Let's hear now from Kerry Allen, the BBC's China analyst, on the impact that this film has had in China.

More than 200 million people have seen Ne Zhaotu over the last month. That's more than 14% of China's 1.4 billion population. Supporting the film has been a way of showing national pride to an industry that has suffered in recent years.

All of us remember those dark days during the COVID-19 pandemic. China had strict lockdown laws meaning that entire buildings, streets and sometimes cities went into lockdown if there were cases of the virus. Even after COVID restrictions were lifted many years later, people were still nervous about going back to the cinema. So Nezha 2 has definitely been a celebration of people getting back to enjoying going to see a film. It's also put a spotlight on how far Chinese animation has come.

Cinema goers have been interviewed in China saying that they're surprised to see a film with special effects that they think are as good as any film to have come out of America.

Chinese audiences have long had the perception that Chinese films have been in the shadow of US Hollywood productions. They haven't done well historically, internationally, partly because production companies have fewer freedoms in terms of what they can put into films. There are strict regulations in place and anything seen as too violent or pornographic is left on the cutting room floor. And of course, anything that might be seen as anti-China or anti-communist party. But this film has been a celebration of China's rich and vibrant history.

Seeing how well the film has done, people want to celebrate. In one city, a noodle shop is offering free meals to people if they show their ticket stubs as a way of thanking them for supporting a domestic film. It's going to be in the Chinese box office until the 30th of March, so there's time for people to get out and watch it yet, and time for it to climb even higher up the rankings and possibly replace Avatar as the highest-grossing film of all time.

And what do people outside of China make of it? This is Sully, who reviews films on YouTube and is based in the US. So I'll be completely honest here. I didn't even know this movie existed until I saw all over the internet just how much money it was making at the box office overseas. So when I sat down to watch this film, I was looking for an interesting story, impressive animation, and a

above all else, bonkers fight sequences, and Najat 2 somehow finds a way to deliver in all three of those areas. When it comes to the visual style, this is the most impressed I've been since Into the Spider-Verse, because the fight scenes feel like they're mixing Dragon Ball Z with the scale of something like Avengers Endgame. Story-wise, this is a fantasy epic,

loosely based on the investiture of the gods, packed with trials like Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. And overall, if you love animation, Chinese mythology, or insane action, Najatu is an absolute must-watch at the cinema. ♪

Kouyou, you mentioned that people are being called unpatriotic if they are critical of the film. What about Chinese government policies and censorship? How do they influence the type of films that are being produced in China? So that's a very interesting topic.

Chinese film censors have constantly been updating the kind of content that they censor across Chinese entertainment. So one thing that could be perfectly fine and popular one day, it could be shunned and scrubbed off the Chinese web the next day. This goes to things like the flaunting of wealth, boys' love or bromance-type dramas where there's some kind of ambiguity between the two male leads.

whatever the government deems as potentially immoral or potentially destabilizing to society, these are red lines that they will constantly refresh. And filmmakers, they have to be aware of where these red lines are, constantly refresh their knowledge of these red lines and be always ready to work around them.

So this film, Nuja 2, has propelled Chinese cinema and especially animation onto the global stage. It came out at about the same time as the new Marvel movie Captain America Brave New World and it is already doing so much better. But China hasn't traditionally been a powerhouse for cinema compared with like the US, India. So what kind of boost will this give to Chinese cinema on the global stage? So far, nothing.

Most of the people watching the movie and buying tickets to watch the movie are ethnic Chinese or people in China themselves. It's hard to say how far this will bring China in terms of filmmaking soft power necessarily, but it is a step. The success of Nezha has definitely brought to the attention of the Chinese government the type of power and influence that cinema could bring to China.

Koyu, thank you so much for joining us. Thanks, Hannah. If you're interested in global cinema trends or you're after some classic movie recommendations from the experts, have a listen to some of our other episodes on the film industry. We've done one called From Hollywood to Nollywood, Our Cinema's Bouncing Back, and another one called Can Zombies and Witches Save Bollywood? You can find them wherever you get your BBC podcasts and do get in touch with us. We're on Instagram, on WhatsApp and on YouTube. Let us know what you think.

Thank you for listening. I'm Hannah Gelbart. This is What In The World from the BBC World Service. We'll see you next time. Bye.