Flooded with Hollywood blockbusters and homegrown historical epics, cinemas in China rarely get the chance to screen films from the sub-continent - despite the fact India boasts the largest film industry in the world. "Bollywood" is thriving, and worldwide hits such as the Oscar-winning "Slumdog Millionaire" (although made by British director Danny Boyle) have helped to focus on India as a source both for stories and locations. And the rare general release on the Chinese mainland of an Indian-made film, 3 Idiots, was another landmark for the country's movie makers.

Engineering students

Loosely adapted from the novel "Five Point Someone" by Chetan Bhagat, 3 Idiots follows the life and schooling of three engineering students - Rancho (Aamir Khan), Farhan Qureshi (R. Madhavan) and Raju Rastogi (Sharman Joshi) - who share a dormitory room at the Imperial College of Engineering (ICE) in New Delhi.

Rancho is unique for his attitude of "flexible" studying, applying the knowledge he learns, rather than memorizing books and automatically obeying his teachers. This naturally brings him into conflict with authority. The comedy not only discusses the problems of India's education system, but also examines people's values in life and re-defines the definition of what it is to be successful. It does this with a plentitude of laughter and tears along the way.

Directed by Rajkumar Hirani and produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra, "3 Idiots" was initially released in India at Christmas 2009. The comedy earned the highest opening-day revenues for any film ever in India and became the first Indian production to cross the 2 billion rupee mark in its domestic market. It also became a frequent award winner, sweeping the 2010 IIFA (International Indian Film Academy) Awards and the 2010 Filmfare Awards.

"A lot of Indian films, such as "3 Idiots", are made for the global market. This is the highest end of the economic spectrum. The problem we have with this 'global market' is that it consists of 95 percent of Indians living abroad," Ashish Rajadhyaksha, author and editor of a number of books on Indian cinema including Indian Cinema in the Time of Celluloid: From Bollywood to the Emergency and Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema, said at a book talk on Indian film in Shanghai last month.

Seen it before

China Film Group Corporation imported the film to the local market, but before "3 Idiots" finally made its way into Chinese mainland cinemas two years after it debuted, it had already become a DVD and download sensation, which meant that many Chinese movie fans had already seen it. However, this new cinematic version features a new mandarin dubbing with a cast of popular local film stars including Wen Zhang, Huang Bo and Tang Wei.

On douban.com, one of the most popular Chinese social networking sites for discussing the arts, 3 Idiots' current average review score is 9.1 (out of 10). And on mtime.com, one of the largest movie portals in China providing movie information, the film has earned an average score of 8.9.

At present in Shanghai, the Hindi blockbuster is showing in about nine cinemas. At UME in downtown Xintiandi, the three-hour film was screened five or six times a day during the first week of release after its nationwide opening on December 8.

"We had an average 60 percent attendance, but the film was given less screenings than the two big Chinese New Year films - 'Flying Swords of Dragon Gate' and 'The Flowers of War'," said Rachel Tang, from the PR department at UME International Cineplex. "The Chinese dubbing is a big attraction and the film is in its original format; it hasn't been cut. However, many foreigners frequent our cinema, and I think it would attract more foreign moviegoers if it retained its original English soundtrack," she told the Global Times.

Continuing popularity

Starting last December, 3 Idiots was screened for more than two months in Taiwanese cinemas, becoming the highest grossing Bollywood film ever in the island's history. And when the film arrived in Hong Kong in September of this year, it opened on 99 screens and raked in more than HK$15 million in seven weeks.

As Press Trust of India (PTI) reported, a whopping 900 prints were released on the Chinese mainland. "It's the first time for any Hindi film to be released with so many prints in China. It is also being adapted into a stage musical in Taiwan," said the director to PTI. It is rumored that Stephen Chow, the director of Kung Fu Hustle, will remake a Chinese version.

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