Int’l influence of Chinese films improving

Key Words:Chinese film; kung-fu film;viewer
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The report "2012 Survey on International Influence of Chinese Films" has been released in Beijing. The survey received a total of 1,175 questionnaires, including 1,117 valid ones, involving 43 kinds of native language groups in 107 countries. A total of 108,000 parameters are obtained through analysis and process of the survey results.
　　
International influence of Chinese films is improving
　
In 2011, most of the respondents believed that the international influence of Chinese films was weak in the overall, where 58 percent believed the international influence of Chinese films was "mediocre" and only 8 percent believed the influence was great. But in 2012, as many as 15 percent of respondents believe that the influence of the Chinese films are great, up 7 percent from the previous year; while viewers who think the influence is limited drop to 25.9 percent.
　
Internet becomes the main viewing channel
　　
The data in 2012 show that 36.5 percent of foreign viewers choose going to the cinema to to watch Chinese films, whereas in 2011 this proportion was 32.3 percent. However, the proportion of viewers who choose to watch Chinese films on Internet has reached 58 percent, up 16 percent from 2011.
　
After analysis, Huang Huilin said so many foreign viewers choose to watch Chinese online partly because Chinese films do not have many opportunities to appear in overseas theaters, and partly because many online resources are free. "This not only reminds us to properly protect the copyright of Chinese films and reduce online piracy, but also prompts us to pay more attention on the application of network tools in the external marketing of the films," he said.
　　
Foreign viewers favor action, martial arts, and comedy films
　　
Action films and kung-fu films have always been the favorite types to foreign viewers. In 2011, the scores of these two types of films were both around 40 percent, while in 2012, their scores rose to 50 percent. "Unexpectedly, in 2012, the popularity of comedies among foreign viewers ranked third among different types of Chinese films, only next to films and kung-fu films." Huang said these three types of films have one thing in common: the frequent use of body language, which results in relatively fewer obstacles for foreign viewers to understand.
　
Stories are hard to understand, story writing is the shortcoming
　　
When answering why they choose to watch Chinese films, the respondents gave relatively concentrated reasons; 64 percent chose "to understand the Chinese culture". However, it is not enough to pass on the Chinese culture by solely relying on body language. Dialogues and story lines are more important tools. But the survey shows that the biggest obstacles for foreign viewers in watching Chinese films are dialogue and story lines.
　　
The dialogue problem is mainly reflected on the translation of the subtitle. In response to the question "what aspect of Chinese films needs to be improved", "subtitle" was selected as an important factor causing difficulties to understand Chinese films. Most foreign viewers precisely need subtitles to understand the story, and further to understand the entire film.
　　
Similarly, up to 51 percent of foreign viewers think that film stories are another factor that needs the most improvement. Nearly 50 percent of foreign viewers think Chinese films are confusing in logic and hard to understand. Huang said that the story writing is still a short board in the internationalization of Chinese films in addition to the impact of cultural differences, language barriers, and other factors.