THE EIGHT HUNDRED (2020): Sino-Japanese War Epic Becomes China’s Biggest 2020 Box Office Hit

The Eight Hundred Becomes China’s Biggest 2020 Box Office Hit

Epic war drama, The Eight Hundred has completely overshadowed Disney’s Mulan to become the biggest worldwide box office hit with record numbers in the Chinese market.

In the early days of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937 before it was engulfed by World War Two, the Japanese Army invaded the city of Shanghai in the first major battle of the war. The plot of The Eight Hundred is similar to that of 300 where a small group of Chinese Kuomintang soldiers resists a vastly larger Japanese force trying to take Shanghai.

The film crushed Mulan over the weekend in China, as Disney’s expected Blockbuster continued to falter in its most important box office. The Eight Hundred, which has been in theatres for a month, earned over seventeen million, lifting its total gross to $423.2 million, according to data from East Asian box office tracker Artisan Gateway.

Mulan, meanwhile, earned only $6.5 million over its second weekend, a seventy two percent drop from its opening. Despite being set in China, based on a Chinese legend and packed with Chinese stars, Mulan brought in just $36.3 million in the Chinese market. The movie’s worldwide theatrical results — $57 million — are even more worrisome for Disney’s bottom line, considering that it cost an estimated two hundred million to make even before marketing. China’s largest online ticketing services company Maoyan forecasts Mulan to finish its Chinese run with just $41 million.

Produced for around $85 million, The Eight Hundred also overtook Sony’s Bad Boys for Life ($424.6 million) to become the biggest worldwide film of 2020 on Monday. As of 5 P.M. Beijing time on Monday, The Eight Hundred had reached $426.5 million in revenue. Maoyan projects the movie to finish its China run at about $445 million. The film’s success marks a huge victory for Beijing-based studio Huayi Brothers Media and the director Guan Hu, who took a risk releasing the film as China’s first blockbuster to hit cinemas amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The film has been credited with signaling the return of the world’s second-biggest box office, where movie theaters are now operating at a healthy seventy five percent of total seating capacity.

Leave your thoughts on The Eight Hundred becoming China’s biggest 2020 box office hit below in the comments section. Readers seeking to support this type of content can visit our Patreon Page and become one of FilmBook’s patrons. Readers seeking more box office news can visit our Box Office Page, our Movie News Facebook Page, and our Movie News Twitter Page. Want up-to-the-minute notification? FilmBook staff members publish articles by Email, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, Reddit, and Flipboard. This movie news was bought to our attention by The Hollywood Reporter.