Grossing over 500 million yuan ($76.85 million) in four days, Ip Man 3, the latest martial arts biopic about the legendary figure, looked like it was going to be another box office blockbuster in the Chinese mainland. However, a scandal over fraudulent ticket sales has cast a shadow on the film.
On Saturday, one day after Ip Man 3's mainland premiere, a public WeChat account run by former film industry reporter Chen Changye posted an article questioning whether the producers of Ip Man 3 were fraudulently altering the film's box office numbers. Over the following days, more doubt was cast on the film's surging box office revenue by the media and netizens as evidence, such as tickets being sold at unusually high prices and empty early and midnight showings of the film being reported as sold-out, came to light.
The scandal eventually caught the attention of China's entertainment watchdog, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT).
Suspicions arise
According to the post on Chen's WeChat account his suspicions were raised when he noticed that for some showings of the film at the Beijing Sanlitun Megabox cinema tickets for the front and back row seats were being booked in advance before the middle rows.
"It's common knowledge that the first rows are usually the worst places to watch a film… [it seems unusual] that so many bad seats were sold when there were still available seats elsewhere," the post read.
According to a report from the Beijing Youth Daily, a China Film Cinema in Wuhan, Hubei Province charged 203 yuan ($31) per ticket for several showings of the film after midnight, yet each of these showings was scheduled for the same movie hall at 10-minute intervals.
It seems these suspicions were confirmed when several cinema and film industry insiders came forward about the fraudulent behavior. In one case, an anonymous individual claiming to be part of the Kuailu Group, one of the companies behind the film, revealed to WeChat public account Yule Ziben Lun that he was disappointed in himself for helping the company "launder money."
On Sunday, the marketing company for Ip Man 3 published a statement to the Beijing Youth Daily and other media outlets through WeChat calling these allegations mere rumors and that it would be releasing an official statement at a later date.
So far no official statement has been released by the company.
Government intervention
According to a report from ent.sina.com.cn, on Monday SAPPRFT issued a notice stating that it is investigating the case and has asked gewara.com and other e-ticket platforms to turn over contracts they signed with the film's distributors.
According to a report from ent.163.com, Zhang Hongsen, director of SAPPRFT's film bureau, posted on his personal WeChat account the message: "It hasn't been easy for the [Chinese] film market to reach today. We should highly treasure it."
The report said that reporters from ent.163.com contacted Zhang on Tuesday morning and that he confirmed that the administration was still on the case.
Although the situation has yet to come to a conclusion, many in the media speculate that the Kuailu Group is attempting to use the high box office revenue to boost the prices of its shares.
While the Chinese film market has continued to grow in recent years - the total box office for 2015 reached 44 billion yuan - this success has been darkened by box office scandals such as this. Last year, Monster Hunt took the top spot at the box office amid accusations that distributors had artificially inflated box office revenue.
