Anybody wanting to see one of China’s most highly-anticipated summer movies this week will be out of luck.
The producers of „Asura“ announced on Weibo, a Twitter-like social media platform used in China, that they were ending the theatrical release, but gave no reason for doing so.
„We apologize to the audience who didn’t get a chance to watch the movie and inconveniences caused for staff with partner companies, as well as highest respect to the crew involved in the production over the past six years,“ the Weibo post said.
The movie tells the story of a shepherd protecting a mythical Buddhist land called Asura from a three-headed demon king. It was panned by the public, scoring a 3.1 rating out of 10 on Chinese film website Douban. Many thought it was a knockoff of the hit HBO series „Game of Thrones.“
The project was backed in part by Jack Ma’s Alibaba Pictures and Zhenjian Film Studio.
Ma and other Chinese entrepreneurs have been open about their ambitions to expand China’s domestic film production as a means of catering to the country’s massive audience. Ma told CNN in 2016 that he would seize any chance to own one of Hollywood’s Big Six film studios: Universal, Paramount, Warner Brothers, Walt Disney, Columbia or 20th Century Fox.
It’s unclear how „Asura“ will rank among other epic box-office disasters, since the movie may still make money from DVD sales and streaming services in the coming months and years.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, „Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas“ lost $125 million and is considered the biggest flop ever. „The Adventures of Pluto Nash,“ starring Eddie Murphy, cost $100 million but only grossed $7 million, The Hollywood Reporter also noted.
