Chinese culinary war film Once Upon A Time In The Middle East has lived up to its blockbuster expectations, earning $134.1m (RMB912m) on its first six days of release.
The film knocked Spider-Man: Brand New Day from the top spot and beat new release The Odyssey, further firing up China’s summer box office to reach $1.52bn (RMB10.36bn).
The film reunites director Wen Muye with producer Ning Hao of Dirty Monkeys, following the success of 2018 summer hit Dying To Survive. Leading the cast is popular actor Shen Teng, whose string of blockbuster hits include China’s biggest film of the year to date Pegasus 3 and 2024 summer hit Successor.
Set in a fictional city in the Middle East, the story follows a Chinese chef who works in an eatery to pay off family debts until war breaks out and transforms the place into a safe haven for local orphans. The Chinese title literally means ‘Welcome To Dragon Restaurant’.
The film amassed $23.53m (RMB160m) from previews alone, even before its unusual release on a Tuesday (August 11) – three days ahead of Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey on Friday, to avoid a head-on collision of the two titles.
Nolan is a familiar name to Chinese audiences as all his recent films have been released in mainland China from 2010’s Inception to 2023’s Oppenheimer. He travelled to Beijing along with stars Matt Damon and Charlize Theron for the local premiere at the China National Film Museum, hyping up excitement for the release of the epic.
The film took $35.9m (RMB244m) including previews from its three-day opening weekend from August 14-16. It ranked second to Once Upon A Time In The Middle East, which took $70.3m (RMB477.9m) over the same three-day period.
Chinese animation All Wishes Come True, which opened on July 18, continued its strong momentum, adding $13.1m (RMB89.3m) for a cume of $235.9m (RMB1.6bn).
Spider-Man: Brand New Day dropped to fourth place with $9.9m (RMB67.4) for a cume of $209m (RMB1.42bn). Since opening on July 29, the superhero film led the daily box office for 12 consecutive days until being knocked off on August 10 by preview screenings of Once Upon A Time In The Middle East.
Stephen Chow’s Kung Fu Soccer was pushed out of the top five over the weekend. It is still the frontrunner of the summer box office with $337.35m (RMB2.29bn) as of August 17. It is also the year’s second biggest film at the China box office to date.
The Chinese summer season, which began on June 1, hit the RMB10bn ($1.48bn) milestone on August 16 after 77 days, exceeding 2024’s summer box office. It surpassed 2025’s summer box office after 49 days.
Box office source: Artisan Gateway and ticketing platform Maoyan
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