As "Titanic 3D" continues to make waves at the Chinese box office, another big ship blockbuster hit the big screen in China Wednesday.
"Battleship," a science fiction naval war film directed and produced by Peter Berg and based on the children's board game by Hasbro, had its Chinese premiere in Beijing on April 18, one month before its expected U.S. premiere.
At a pre-premiere ceremony held on April 15, Berg, who was in China to promote the movie, explained why he chose to include Chinese elements and why he refrained from using increasingly popular 3D technology for the movie.
"I've always admired Chinese culture," said Berg, reminiscing about his father's admiration for ancient Chinese military general Sun Tzu's classic military treatise "The Art of War." Berg added that as Hong Kong is one of his favorite cities in the world, he just wanted to be there and meet some old friends. As a result, the film's Hong Kong plot was born.
The plot sees Berg crash one alien ship in Hong Kong and introduce the tactics and strategies of Sun Tzu (also referred to as "Sunzi") in order to conduct operations against alien ships.
The film has received a mixed reception from film critics so far, with many lambasting the film for its "armada of cinematic clichés and truly awful dialogue." Berg, however, commented that he enjoys taking people somewhere they have never been before via vivid visual effects.
But the director refused to adopt 3D. "I'm not huge fan of 3D personally, it gives me a headache," he said. "I always find myself taking my glasses off and rubbing my head."
Berg is, however, a fan of IMAX. "I do like IMAX, I do like the big powerful screen," he said, adding that he was aware that China has DMAX technology, with screens just a little smaller than those used in IMAX. Independent Chinese technology went into the making of DMAX in an attempt to break the IMAX cinematic monopoly. The technology was only put into commercial use this month and Berg was definitely impressed with what he saw. He said:"I saw 'Battleship' on DMAX, which is very good, very exciting, very dynamic."
Peter Berg's next movie project may be "Hancock 2" and he has a meeting next month with Will Smith to discuss the project. Berg also said that he would like to direct a modern action film in China. He commented that if he were to shoot "Battleship 2," he would like to try to seek cooperation with the Chinese navy.
"Battleship", released by Universal Pictures, opened with a respectable US$55.2 million from 26 territories last week, second only to "Titanic 3D's" US$67 million gross worldwide. The movie fared particularly well in Asia, where it opened on top in South Korea (US$8 million), and was also strong in Japan (US$4.9 million). The film also claimed first place in the U.K. (US$6.1 million), Germany (US$5 million), Australia (US$4.2 million), Spain (US$3 million) and Italy (US$3 million), and had a very solid second place opening in France (US$3.8 million). It also topped box office charts in Hong Kong and Taiwan.