作者/Patrick Brzeski

編譯/張孟碟

中國龐大的電影產(chǎn)業(yè)從誕生日起，就受到政策的多方位保護，現(xiàn)在，中國打開了外資進入影院行業(yè)的大門。

6月30日，國家發(fā)展改革委、商務(wù)部發(fā)布《外商投資準入特別管理措施（負面清單）（2019年版）》，負面條目從2018年的48個減少至40個。其中，“電影院、經(jīng)營需由中方控股”在新版中被刪除。

▲ 《外商投資準入特別管理措施（負面清單）（2019年版）》

▲ 圖片來源：中華人民共和國中央人民政府

外國企業(yè)的猶豫

然而，新規(guī)則允許的具體內(nèi)容仍然有些不清楚。雖然現(xiàn)在似乎允許外國公司對電影院進行“操作和建設(shè)”，但文件中其他地方保留的含糊不清的措辭仍然沒有解決中國的電影院是否可以由國際公司直接擁有，或者在什么所有制結(jié)構(gòu)下的問題。（例如，與中國公司建立合資企業(yè)的要求是否仍然存在？外國公司在業(yè)務(wù)中的份額有多大？）

“解釋和實施的靈活性是北京熟悉的策略，”北京哈里斯布里肯律師事務(wù)所的合伙人馬修奧爾德森補充道。“在一些國際公司真正開始嘗試并且應(yīng)用之前，我們不會完全知道什么是可能的。”

另外一個問題是，外國公司在中國龐大的影院產(chǎn)業(yè)中有多大的增長機會。代表中國工作室參與國際交易的Manatt，Phelps＆Phillips合伙人林賽·康納指出：“你當然不能說現(xiàn)在進入中國影院市場的公司將取得優(yōu)勢地位。”

在過去二十年中，中國屏幕從僅有數(shù)百塊爆炸發(fā)展到超過64,000塊，中國也成為了世界上影院數(shù)量最大、最高水平國家。總部位于北京的大連萬達集團，不僅是中國也是全球最大的參展商，擁有多元化的房地產(chǎn)，幾乎占據(jù)了中國所有主要城市。

與此同時，大多數(shù)指標表明，中國的劇院建設(shè)熱潮終于達到了飽和點，而且該行業(yè)甚至可能陷入困境。上海電影咨詢公司Artisan Gateway的總裁蘭斯·鮑爾斯說：“這是很重要的現(xiàn)狀，因為我們看到的是中國工業(yè)正在轉(zhuǎn)型。”

根據(jù)Artisan Gateway的數(shù)據(jù)，2019年上半年，中國的門票收入與去年同期相比下降了2.7％。大多數(shù)觀察人士認為由于北京的稅收打擊、過去一年的嚴厲審查以及其他國內(nèi)融資挑戰(zhàn)導(dǎo)致了國內(nèi)電影產(chǎn)量下滑。同時，平均票價從2018年的35.6元（5.17美元）到今年38.6元（5.61美元）的上漲還暗藏了一個更令人擔(dān)憂的趨勢：今年上半年入場總?cè)藬?shù)下降10.3％，而且每塊電影屏幕平均票房收入下滑16.7個百分比。

那么，北京突然更容易接受一些國際資源和運營最佳實踐，這可能很自然，畢竟國內(nèi)冠軍已經(jīng)如此根深蒂固。

中國市場仍不可忽視

盡管對那些常年或周期性在中國開展業(yè)務(wù)的人都存在困難，政策也似乎仍然模棱兩可，但主要的國際影院連鎖店不太可能完全避開北京的邀請。畢竟中國可能已經(jīng)擁有比北美多50％的電影屏幕（約64,900，而不是40,300），但其人口是美國的四倍多（13.9億與3.27億相比）。

康納補充說：“中國市場已經(jīng)為當?shù)赜霸汗镜难杆籴绕鹛峁┝舜罅糠?wù)，但它仍然是一個無法忽視的大市場。我認為每家大型影院公司都會給予認真對待。”

政策放寬是20國集團峰會的后續(xù)

這一變化的時機在20國集團峰會上，習(xí)近平和特朗普舉行會談，在承諾取消威脅性關(guān)稅增加的幾天后，相關(guān)政策發(fā)布了。業(yè)內(nèi)多人對此稱好，因為這表明貿(mào)易戰(zhàn)不會影響好萊塢在中國的發(fā)展。（HBO和臺灣公視聯(lián)合出品的原創(chuàng)劇集《我們與惡的距離》獲得了中國監(jiān)管機構(gòu)的批準，同一周內(nèi)在騰訊視頻上線，這表明北京可能最近放寬了美國視頻內(nèi)容的審批。）

“在貿(mào)易戰(zhàn)的背景下，有一種趨勢是在這里和那里做出小小的讓步，這可能就是其中之一，”奧爾德森說。“如果會議導(dǎo)致緊張局勢升級，很難想象他們會采取這一步驟。”

（譯文有刪節(jié)）

以下為英文原文

ChinaOpens Door for Foreign Movie Theater Chains, But Will They Enter?

2:58PM PDT 7/9/2019 by Patrick Brzeski

Summary：The country with the world's largestpotential moviegoing audience appears to be inviting foreign investment rightas growth in the sector finally begins to slow.

Body：After years of restrictions on virtuallyevery front of its massive film sector, China has cracked the door open to foreignmovie theater chains.

On June 30, China’s National Developmentand Reform Commission (NDRC) issued an update to its so-called "NegativeList," the official government document that outlines which industries areout of bounds for foreign investment. The number of sectors and sub-sectors onthe list was cut from 2018's total of 48 to 40 this year. The new 2019 listremoved investment restrictions on industries ranging from oil exploration tofarming, as well as one significant change for the entertainment business: Arestriction stipulating that "the construction and operation of cinemasmust be controlled by a Chinese party" was dropped.

The timing of the changes — just days afterPresident Donald Trump met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the G20 summit andpledged to back down from threatened tariff increases — struck many in theindustry as an encouraging sign that Beijing's trade war retaliations wouldn'tbe engulfing Hollywood's vital China business anytime soon. (HBO Asia'sTaiwanese original series The World Between Us received permission from Chineseregulators to stream on Tencent Video the same week, offering encouragementthat Beijing may have lifted a recent freeze on U.S. video content approvals.)

"In the context of the trade war,there is a tendency for small concessions to be made here and there, and thisis probably one of them," says Mathew Alderson, a partner at HarrisBricken Attorneys & Consultants in Beijing. "It's hard to imagine thatthey would have taken this step had that meeting resulted in an escalation oftensions."

Exactly what the new rules allow remainssomewhat unclear, however. Although the "operation and construction"of cinemas by foreign firms appears to be permitted now, ambiguous wordingretained elsewhere in the document leaves unresolved the question of whethermovie theaters in China can be directly owned by international parties, orunder what ownership structures. (Does the usual requirement of entering into ajoint venture with a Chinese firm still hold, for example? And just how largecan the foreign party's share of the business be in practice?)

"Flexibility in interpretation andimplementation is a familiar strategy from Beijing," adds Alderson."We won't fully know what's possible until some international companiesactually try to work through this system and we see how it is applied."

How much opportunity for growth is left forforeign firms to capitalize on in China's massive exhibition sector is anotherquestion. "You certainly can't say that companies going into theaterconstruction in China now will be getting in on the ground floor," pointsout Lindsay Connor, a partner at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, who regularlyrepresents Chinese studios in international deals.

Over the past two decades, China's theatricalexhibition footprint has exploded from hundreds of screens to a networktotaling more than 64,000 — the largest and most state-of-the-art exhibitionoutlay of any country on the planet. Beijing-based Dalian Wanda Group, bothChina's and the world's largest exhibitor, already has a multiplex occupyingprime real estate in virtually every major Chinese city.

Meanwhile, most indicators suggest China'sgreat theater-building boom is finally reaching a leveling-off point — and thatthe sector could even be ailing. "It's significant that this announcementhas come now, because what we see is that the Chinese industry is intransition," says Rance Pow, president of Shanghai-based cinema consultingfirm Artisan Gateway.

In the first half of 2019, ticket salesrevenue in China fell 2.7 percent compared to the same period last year,according to Artisan Gateway's data. Most observers have blamed the drop on adownturn in domestic film production caused by Beijing's tax crackdown andcensorship uptick over the past year, along with other domestic financingchallenges. But an increase in average ticket prices — from RMB 35.6 ($5.17) in2018 to RMB 38.6 ($5.61) this year — has masked a more worrying trend: a 10.3percent decline in total admissions in the first half of the year, and a 16.7percent slip in the average box office revenue generated per movie screen.

"We're starting to see what looks likethe beginnings of a consolidation stage in the Chinese exhibition industry,which would be led by the failure of some smaller companies, and at some pointbigger failures of business," Pow says.

It's perhaps natural, then, that Beijing issuddenly more receptive to bringing in some international resources andoperational best practices — especially since the domestic champions arealready so well-entrenched.

Despite the difficulties — both thoseperennial to doing business in China, and the cyclical downturn — it's unlikelythat the major international theater chains will eschew Beijing's invitationaltogether, as ambiguous as it may still be. China may already have 50 percentmore movie screens than North America (approximately 64,900, compared with40,300), but its population is more than four times that of the U.S. (1.39billion compared to 327 million).

Adds Connor: "The Chinese market hasbeen substantially serviced by the rapid rise of local theater companies, butit's still far too big a market to ignore. I suspect every major theatercompany will be giving this a very hard look."