Wanda's purchase of the Legendary production house is no guarantee of a happy ending

At first glance, China's latest Hollywood deal - Wanda Group's purchase of Legendary Entertainment - is a hardware-software match made in box-office heaven.

The news that Wang Jianlin, one of China's richest men, is snapping up a Hollywood blockbuster production house is at once breathtaking and utterly predictable. It complements a movie-theater empire that includes thousands of screens on both sides of the Pacific, and meshes nicely with plans for the world's biggest studio.

Can a "Hollywood East" by the sea be accomplished through mergers and moneymen alone?

China's phenomenal growth in recent years reflects, at least in part, a willingness to think big, to tread where others dare not, and to copy, co-opt and take big chances.

The question remains, can a cultural efflorescence such as cinematic achievement be conjured up and brought to fruition like an industrial-strength infrastructure project?

President Xi Jinping has stated that China needs to do a better job of presenting itself to the world. Along comes Wang Jianlin, heeding the call, with a grand plan to make China a major film power by fiat and deep-pocketed investment. The problem is, what works for rockets and trains may not work for movies.

Creative success is quirky, subject to shifting tastes and capricious audiences.

Film is a fickle business. It is hard to think of a moneymaking realm where money is more at risk. Grounded in the nuances of human nature and human spirit, art is hard to harness and quantify. Cold cash cannot begin to pin the creative genie down.

Hollywood success reflects a century of resourceful hits and misses, bouts of outright titillation, tireless trial and error, constant experimentation, and unplanned, organic growth.

The marriage of Wanda and Legendary may indeed boost the fortunes of both companies, especially if investor excitement reaches the threshold of a stock listing in Hong Kong or Shenzhen. Legendary has been keen on the China market for some time now, its ambitions best expressed in the long-delayed but evocatively titled film being produced by its China spin-off production arm, Legendary East.

The Great Wall, helmed by iconic director Zhang Yimou, is due for release this year. It's not immediately clear how an action picture starring US star Matt Damon that sees him battle with computer-generated dragons against the backdrop of a mock Great Wall will contribute to boosting China's standing in the world, but the mechanics and muscle behind the flick will ensure massive publicity and a wide opening in Wanda theaters everywhere.

Exhibiting films is both simple and utterly opaque. Theaters thrive on selling tickets and popcorn, but what makes people want to go to a movie?

Hollywood is so ruthless in rewarding success and punishing failure that even the best directors are only as good as their last film. Today's toast of the town is only a flop away from losing all cachet.

Theater ownership is certainly no guarantee of box-office success, and quotas are no guarantee of quality. Yet Wang is a savvy businessman, so it would be premature to suggest he has bitten off a bit more than he can chew. Inasmuch as the Wanda empire of screens and its vast studio-project are basically real estate ventures, it still lacks the creative spark that animates all good art.

It is the rare film, such as Star Wars, Titanic or Avatar that soars in every available market. But it is also worth noting that these films reflect the creative stamp of stubborn, rugged individualists.

Such films are the box-office standards to beat, but they are hard to emulate. If Wanda can crack the code and produce mass-market films worthy of solitary genius, China would indeed gain prestige and be a force to be reckoned with in global cinema.

The author is a visiting research fellow at Cornell University in New York. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

(China Daily European Weekly 01/29/2016 page13)