Thanks to the recommendation of a friend, I checked out the trailer for Monkey King, and it is some really wild sh*t. While one early review considered it a mixed bag, it’s already doing gangbuster business in China, where the myth of the story takes place.
As Variety tells us, King is #1 at the box office in China, and it’s also the top movie at the box office globally. Greg Foster, the CEO of Imax, happily told the trade publication that Monkey King’s big opening day “is now our biggest Imax day ever, for either a Hollywood or Chinese title.”
It remains to be seen if The Monkey King can crossover and do well here on American shore. It will probably take a big push from whoever’s releasing it here, along with good reviews and word of mouth. But again, the trailer showed some really wild visuals that definitely threw me for a loop, and I’m not the biggest fan of CGI.
If 3D gives it an even wilder dimension of excitement on the big screen, perhaps it will indeed be a big hit here in the States, and we at TGD will definitely be checking in on its progress. The American film market is relying so much on China for more box office dollars, and it would really be a trip to see a Chinese epic makes big bucks on our shores, like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon did back in 2000.
