Star Flops and Stalled Releases Keep China Quiet on the Festival Circuit, Tokyo Programmer Says
Star power no longer guarantees a hit in China, and that helps explain why Chinese films have been less visible at international festivals this year. That is the view of Ichiyama Shozo, programming director of the Tokyo International Film Festival, who spoke to Variety.
Ichiyama said many films with famous actors in the lead roles flopped at the Chinese box office in 2026. Casting a star used to offer a fair degree of success, he said, but that is no longer reliable. Money is also drying up. He told Variety that investment in Chinese films has slowed, and that many titles are reportedly sitting unreleased because the censorship process has become more complicated.
Censorship here means the government review that a film must pass before cinemas can show it. Delays at that stage can leave a finished film on a shelf for months or longer, which means it may never reach the festival circuit at all.
Ichiyama is no stranger to Chinese-language cinema. He has worked closely with the Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien and the Chinese director Jia Zhangke, according to Variety. He was appointed programming director of the Tokyo festival in 2021.
Festivals matter because they act as shop windows. Sales agents and buyers gather to see new films, and the deals struck there often decide which films reach cinemas, and when, sometimes two years later. A quieter Chinese presence in those rooms means fewer titles on offer to the buyers who fill cinemas around the world.
The 39th Tokyo International Film Festival opens on October 26 and runs until November 4, with more than 200 films on its programme, according to the festival's own announcement. Its main Competition section has 15 films. Each one must have at least an Asian premiere, meaning its first public screening anywhere in Asia. The festival aims for roughly half of those 15 to come from Asia, while the rest are usually world premieres, Variety reported.
Every film on a screen has passed through a long line of decisions: who to cast, how much to spend, which censors to satisfy, and which festival to show it at first. Ichiyama's comments put some of those decisions in China under the spotlight this year. What happens to the stalled titles, and whether star casting regains its pull at the Chinese box office, will shape the country's festival presence in the years ahead.
