Washington, Dec.6 (ANI): Disagreements with U.S. trade policy and the recent success of American movies at the expense of Chinese films has prompted the Chinese authorities to ban the screening of American movies for at least three months.
According to a report in the Daily Variety, the ban has come into fact since last Saturday (December 1) and will continue at least till the end of February. Chinese sources, however, say it could continue until May 2008.
Four films that would normally have expected to be cleared for release in January or February have been locked out: Disney's "Enchanted," DreamWorks' "Bee Movie," Paramount's "Stardust" and Warner's "Beowulf." Sony's "The Pursuit of Happyness" was cleared by censors, but also finds itself shut out.
The ban was not announced in writing, but some Chinese exhibitors became aware of the policy last week at an exhib convention held in Zhuhai, Guangdong Province, on the eve of this week's CineAsia confab in Macau.
