The Impact of Fan Culture on China’s Film Industry

Abstract

This paper discusses the impact of fan culture on the Chinese film industry. The continuous advancement of technology has changed the nature of ‘fan’ culture, which is now a daily presence in public life and, both directly and indirectly, exerts influence on the mass entertainment industry. A new, distinctive industry that has emerged from this new culture is fan films, or commercial films oriented toward a specific ‘fandom’ and that seeks to take advantage of a franchise’s cultural capital, reaping the benefits of fan attention. The ‘fan film’ model has even begun to influence the Chinese film industry, with films featuring certain idols gaining automatic support from a large number of fans, regardless of film quality. However, public opinion of these films is often polarised, For the main audiences of commercial and fan films, they will think that these movies that meet their tastes deserve a high rating. But there is also a part of the movie-viewing group that thinks the production and content of these movies are not sophisticated and deep enough to deserve a good rating. To understand this complex phenomenon, a deeper look into fan culture is necessary, specifically its characteristics, impact on the film industry, and how the film industry in turn manipulates fan culture to its benefit. This study will therefore seek to see how movies, stars and fans work together to promote China’s film industry using both sociological and communicative analysis.