Despite Being Condemned as US Propaganda, 'Zootopia' Likely to Become Disney's Top Movie in China

Disney’s latest animated feature Zootopia has been such a runaway success in China – raking in RMB 1.4 billion (USD 222 million), that it has even been granted a rare two week extension of its theatrical release.

The film was supposed to have wrapped up at cinemas on April 3 but now it looks like it has a solid chance of passing Avengers: Age of Ultron on Friday to become Disney’s highest-grossing film ever in China. It's also expected to surpass Kung Fu Panda 3 to become China's highest-grossing animated film.

Propelling the movie’s success has been an enormous amount of social media buzz fueled by memes aplenty. Netizens have even dubbed some of the the scenes featuring the fox, rabbit, and sloth characters into different dialects, like Inner Mongolian, Sichuanese, Mandarin, and Shanghainese.

The film has so captivated audiences in the Middle Kingdom that there are even reports that black-market sales of fennec foxes – the type of creature and main character played by Nick Wilde – have exploded. According to the LA Times, you can buy a  couple of fennec foxes for just USD 6,150.

But despite the movie’s success, not everyone is a fan.

“Hollywood has long been an effective propaganda machine for the US by using blockbuster films to promote US values and global strategy,” thundered an editorial in the PLA Daily on Wednesday.

“In a world of cruel reality, it is always a wolf that eats a sheep instead of the other way round. Such a fundamental concept that even a child could understand was easily turned around by Hollywood,” the article said, sounding like a Philosophy undergrad having a particularly bad existential crisis. 

In response, Chinese social media users have resoundingly slapped down the PLA Daily of accusing it of overthinking things and of having zero chill.

Despite the scathing review, it’s probably not going to drag down the film’s Rotten Tomato score which is currently sitting pretty at an impressive 98 percent. The film does have deeper lessons to impart on its viewers, but by all accounts achieves its message of inclusiveness without being heavy-handed or overly saccharine.

Reviews by authors whose actual day-job is writing movie reviews have been somewhat more subtle. This one at Sina by Wang Haitao, also sees layers upon layers of meaning in the cartoon and gives it extremely high praise by saying it’s so good it’s almost ban-able.

The film exposes how a society may look peaceful and ideal on the outside, argues the writer, but at the same time contains many different levels of darkness and conspiracy on the inside. (If the censors really understood it, they’d ban it on grounds of its subtext.)

It’s not the first time Disney has rankled some of the more conservative elements of Chinese society. Last month, a culture official from east China’s Anhui province warned against a Westernization of Chinese culture if the country allowed too many Disneyland theme parks into China.

Speaking at the “two sessions,” a high-level political gathering held each year in Beijing, Li Xiusong suggested more Chinese-style theme parks should be encouraged to rival the Disney resort.

“Since children will pursue Western culture when they are young, they will like Western culture when they grow up,” he said, according to local reports. “Hence, they will become uninterested in Chinese culture.”

“If Chinese culture can’t attract Chinese children, it will gradually start to influence Socialism with Chinese characteristics,” Li said.

You’ve been warned.

– Additional reporting Zoe Law & Sophia Lin

Image: cartoonbrew.com