As China looks to bring more diversity to its foreign release quota, currently dominated by Hollywood fare, Chinese distributor Turbo Films has struck a deal to release Russian Cold War movie Guardians in the country next year.
The deal was reached between the Chinese company and the movie's Russian production company, Enjoy Movies, and sale agent Planeta Inform on a revenue-sharing basis, a spokesperson for Planeta Inform told The Hollywood Reporter.
The movie will take one of China's 34 annual import quota spots. In recent years, only one other Russian movie, Stalingrad, was released in China under the import quota.
Fyodor Bondarchuk's WWII action film, distributed by HuaXia, came out in 2013 and grossed $11.5 million in China, which made it the largest foreign market for the movie.
Guardians, whose Russian title is Zashchitniki, is set at the height of the Cold War era and features a group of Soviet superheroes defending their country. Under the same deal, Turbo Films will co-produce sequel Guardians 2.
Guardians, which is currently in production, is set to be released in China in the first quarter of 2017.
The movie is directed by Sarik Andreasyan, known for last year's American Heist, starring Adrien Brody and Hayden Christensen.