Red Carpet: Hollywood, China, and the Global Battle for Cultural Supremacy

Wall Street Journal reporter Schwartzel makes an eye-opening debut with this accomplished account of how soft power—namely, entertainment—helped China become one of the most influential players on the global stage. In 1994, the country started allowing Hollywood movies in theaters, and soon after imported films began screening there, Schwartzel writes, the country rapidly became “a market too big to ignore and too lucrative to anger.” But the country’s government disapproved of politically inclined films such as Seven Years in Tibet and Kundun. Studios that ran afoul of the regime (including Disney) were denied access to the Chinese market, and the government engaged in box office “blackmail” in order to make North Korea the villain (instead of China) in MGM’s update of Red Dawn and to incorporate Chinese actors in Transformers. Schwartzel covers a lot of ground, explaining how, for instance, China’s tactics for “using... movies to change minds” were learned from old Hollywood. While later chapters on China’s influence on African infrastructure projects feel like filler, it’s overall nonetheless an illuminating look at what China learned from Hollywood, and why Hollywood needs China to survive. It’s a fascinating take on the crossroads of film and global politics. (Feb.)