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DOI: 10.1177/2059436418755532
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Business, soft power, and
whitewashing: Three themes in the
US media coverage of “The Great
Wall” film
Xiaoqun Zhang
University of North Texas, USA
Abstract
Applying the grounded theory approach, this study identified three major themes–business, soft
power, and whitewashing–in the US media coverage of “The Great Wall” film, which is the biggest
co-production between Hollywood and China in history. It also discussed the interconnections
among the three themes and the implications of these interconnections. The connection between
business and soft power revealed China’s strategy of enhancing its soft power through business
collaborations with Hollywood. The connections between whitewashing and business, and between
whitewashing and soft power, suggested the dialectical dynamics among them. This complex
dynamics would influence the soft power of both China and the United States.
Keywords
Business, China, Hollywood, soft power, whitewashing
“The Great Wall” film is the biggest US–China co-production in history with a cost around US$150
million. Directed by the most renowned Chinese director Zhang Yimou, and casted by many super-
stars in both Hollywood and China such as Matt Damon, Andy Lau and Hanyu Zhang, this film
attracted the attentions of film professionals, critics, and moviegoers in China. Although moviego-
ers rated it 4.9 out of 10 at Douban, the most influential film social media networking site, the film
gained US$170.9 million from Chinese market. In the United States and other markets outside
mainland China, the box office performance was disappointing. It only grossed US$45.1 million in
the United States and Canada, the biggest film market in the world. This film was also rated low
Corresponding author:
Xiaoqun Zhang, Department of Media Arts, University of North Texas, 1155 Union Circle #310589, Denton, TX
76203-5017, USA.
Email: Xiaoqun.Zhang@unt.edu
755532GCH0010.1177/2059436418755532Global Media and ChinaZhang
research-article2018
Original Article
2 Global Media and China
on Rotten Tomatoes, an American review aggregation website for film and television. Only 35%
of critics gave it positive reviews.
Obviously, “The Great Wall” is not a successful movie compared with other Hollywood block-
busters such as “Transformers” and “Avatar.” Nevertheless, this biggest co-production film has
significant implications for the relationship between Hollywood and China. As Hollywood is a
national brand for the United States and plays a vital role in building America’s soft power, this
co-production also has significant implications for the soft power of both nations. The relationship
between Hollywood and China has come to be prominent in recent years, as Chinese companies
such as the Dahlian Wanda Group (hereafter, Wanda) have made huge investments in Hollywood.
These acquisitions caused the trepidation of Chinese incursion in the movie industry in the US
public sector. In all, 16 US House of Representative members penned a letter to the head of the
Government Accountability Office. They urged the government to dedicate special scrutiny on
Chinese investments in Hollywood, and suggested to broaden the definition of national security by
including film and news media institutions (Wong, 2016).
By analyzing the US media coverage of “The Great Wall” film, this study identified three major
themes from the content: business, soft power, and whitewashing. The interconnections of these
three themes and the categories under them were discussed. These interconnections suggested new
angles to understand the relationship between Hollywood and China, and revealed their complex
and dialectical impacts on the soft power of both China and the United States.
Literature review
Hollywood and China
Hollywood first accessed China as early as 1930s when Chinese films were regarded as in the
“golden age” (Y. Zhang, 2004). During the two decades of 1930s and 1940s, Hollywood movies
occupied about 75% of Chinese film market (Wendy, 2011). But its access to Chinese market had
been interrupted for three decades since the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in
1949. Hollywood regained its access after China adopted reform and open policies. Paramount and
Universal were the first Hollywood studios that distributed their movies in China. In 1994, the
Ministry of Radio, Film and Television decided to import 10 Hollywood movies. And Warner
Brothers became the first studio that had revenue share contract with China Film Export and Import
Corporation, a model followed by many other Hollywood studios (Jihong & Kraus, 2002).
Hollywood’s return should first attribute to China’s reform and open policies, which have fun-
damentally transformed China’s economic and cultural landscapes. It should also attribute to the
need of China’s film market. China’s film market had suffered a great depression during the 1990s.
The number of Chinese moviegoers decreased 5 million person-times every year, resulting in a
deep decline of box office (Wang & Ren, 1999). A majority of Chinese movie studios were heavily
debt-ridden. And thousands of film-related enterprises either closed or were forced to do other
business (Fang, 1997). To bolster the rapid plummeting film market, Chinese government decided
to open the door to Hollywood and facilitated the reform in film industry. Hollywood played a role
of “savior” during this period as its films attracted a large number of audiences and boosted the box
office (Wan, 2005). By the end of 20th century, 10 Hollywood movies conquered about 70% of
China’s film market, while domestic films only captured the remaining 30% (Rosen, 2002; Zheng,
2000). To improve the competitiveness of domestic films, Chinese government advocated market-
oriented reforms and actively promoted the Hollywood model. It abolished the state monopoly
Zhang 3
over distribution after 1993 and invited non-state investment in the film production. With the guid-
ance of the government, Chinese film industry underwent a full-scale commercialization with ver-
tical integration of production, distribution and exhibition (Jihong & Kraus, 2002).
Although Chinese moviegoers enthusiastically embraced Hollywood movies, the debate around
Hollywood movies swept multiple parties in cinema circles. Along with moviegoers, film distribu-
tors and exhibitors propped up the importation of Hollywood movies as they boosted box office
and revitalized China’s film market. Some scholars cheered the benefits brought by Hollywood
movies, stating that Chinese filmmakers learned advanced skills and technologies, and Chinese
film managers learned marketing and business strategies from Hollywood (Song, 1995; Xi, 1995).
Some also argued that Hollywood movies helped Chinese audiences know more about the outside
world and broaden their worldviews (Zheng, 1994). On the other hand, scholars especially the left-
wing intellectuals strongly opposed the importation of Hollywood movies. They held that the entry
of Hollywood would strangle indigenous film industry and lead to the destruction of domestic
films (Jihong & Kraus, 2002). Some of them criticized the content of Hollywood movies, arguing
that they are deprived of esthetic value and philosophical depth (A. Zhou, 1998). Some critics
adopted cultural imperialism perspective and predicted that Hollywood movies spread American
ideologies that endanger Chinese traditional culture and destroy Chinese people’s collective
national identity (Yin, 2004).
Chinese authorities also retained a paradoxical position toward Hollywood. They guided the
commercialization reform following the Hollywood model, were glad to see the revitalization of
film industry, and wanted to learn the Hollywood’s technical mastery to reform their propaganda
strategies (Jihong & Kraus, 2002). Meanwhile, they raised a serious concern that the Hollywood
cultural invasion would destroy the communist ideologies on which their regime is built. In prac-
tice, they enforced strict quotas and censored the content of Hollywood to build strong protection-
ist barriers as most Chinese filmmakers advocated for protective policies (Crane, 2014). Although
Chinese government raised the annual quota to 34 after China acceded to World Trade Organization
(WTO) (Wyatt, Cieply, & Barnes, 2012), and added 14 more after Chinese President Xi Jingping
visited the United States in 2012 (Grimm, 2015), this number is very small compared with more
than 600 Chinese domestic movies produced by Chinese film companies (Statista, n.d.).
China’s film industry has not suffered from the strict quota policy as it has undergone a booming
period since the beginning of the new millennium. The rapid economic growth, the commercializa-
tion of domestic film industry, as well as the raised quotas, have driven it into the fastest growing
film market in the world. In 2016, China grossed US$6.6 billion of box office, ranking as the num-
ber one international box office market (Motion Picture Association of America, 2016). China will
surpass the United States and become the largest film market in 2017 (Bloomberg News, 2016).
Hollywood gleaned huge profits from China’s prosperous film market. Transformers, 2012, Avatar,
Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Titanic 3D, Transformers: Age of Extinction were the top-gross-
ing films in China in 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2014, respectively. Although the top gross-
ing film in 2016 was a domestic film (The Mermaid), three Hollywood movies ranked the second,
third, and fifth (Zootopia, Warcraft, and Captain America: Civil War) (“List of Highest-Grossing,”
n.d.).
China’s huge and flourished film market has enormous attraction to Hollywood (Hunt, 2014).
Although the strict quotas and content censorship have frustrated Hollywood studios, they have
gradually learned the strategies to adapt to these restrictions. For example, after several films
related to Dalai Lama being banned by Chinese government, such as Seven Years in Tibet and
Kundun, Hollywood studios have engaged in self-censorship when their films are targeted Chinese
4 Global Media and China
market. As a result, such films would no longer be produced by Hollywood studios (Ho, 2011).
Moreover, to pander to Chinese authorities and audiences, Hollywood studios incorporated more
Chinese elements in their movies through multiple approaches: casting more Chinese actors, bor-
rowing Chinese stories, adopting Chinese background, and simulating Chinese gong fu (Chao,
2012).
China’s soft power strategies
Soft power was first introduced in Nye (1990), and more fully developed in Nye (2004). It was
defined as “the ability to get what you want through attraction rather than coercion or payments. It
arises from the attractiveness of a country’s culture, political ideals, and policies” (Nye, 2004, p.
x). During the past two decades, this concept has attracted the attention of scholars across multiple
disciplines and political leaders all over the world. It has also been frequently used in news cover-
age, and become a common keyword in the discourse of international politics.
Chinese scholars argued that the core ideology of soft power is consistent with their traditional
philosophies such as Taoist and Confucius (Ding, 2008). To further build this concept, they pro-
vided new insights on the conceptualization of it. For example, Peking University Soft Power
Study Team (2009) expanded Nye’s definition by adding two additional components: institutions
and the quality of people. Huang and Ding (2010) added two other components: good governance
and technological innovations. G. Sun (2015) segmented culture force into cultural attraction, lin-
guistic persuasion, moral influence, spiritual vigor, intellectual creativity, theoretical guidance, the
force of public opinion, and artistic charm. Overall, Chinese scholars proffered a broader concep-
tualization of soft power than Nye’s initial one (Lee, 2016).
Chinese political leaders have shown huge passions in promoting China’s soft power. The cur-
rent president Xi Jinping announced “We should increase China’s soft power, give a good Chinese
narrative, and better communicate China’s messages to the world” (Feith, 2015). His predecessor,
the former president Hu Jintao, also voiced a similar proclamation that China will build its socialist
cultural soft power. The remarkable economic growth during the past several decades has enhanced
China’s economic and military might, which makes Chinese political leaders be more confident in
pursuing the leadership in the world. President Xi’s “Chinese Dream” initiative, essentially the
rejuvenation of China’s significant influence in the world it had possessed for a long time in his-
tory, crystalizes China’s ambition.
However, China suffers a severe deficit of soft power compared with the United States.
According to Portland (2016), China’s soft power was listed 27th among 30 sample countries, and
the United States was listed at the top of the list. Pew Research Center (2015) reported that China
had a less favorable image than the United States among the world’s leading economies. This defi-
cit drives Chinese leaders to employ multiple strategies to enhance soft power. In particular, China
has actively engaged in organizing and participating in international organizations, negotiations,
and forums, and held two mega events: Beijing Olympics in 2008 and Shanghai World Expo in
2010 (Zhao, 2016). China has also made great efforts to build the strength of Chinese media in the
international arena. These efforts are embodied by the “external propaganda” project, which was
estimated to have a US$10 billion annual budget (Shambaugh, 2015). With such strong financial
supports, Chinese media have gained rapid expansion overseas. Xinhua News Agency employs
3000 journalists and has 170 bureaus around the world. It is implementing the strategy of trans-
forming into a modern multimedia conglomerate. Chinese government’s support helps Xinhua
built stronger capacity to compete with the Western media giants such as Associated Press, Reuter,
Zhang 5
and News Corporation (Shambaugh, 2015). China Central Television (CCTV) broadcasts in six
languages around the world, and it set up branches in Nairobi, Kenya, and the United States. China
Radio International broadcasts in 38 languages and maintains 27 overseas bureaus. China has also
increased the investments in the education projects overseas. For example, Chinese government
sponsors China’s Confucius Institute that operates 475 centers in 120 countries.
One of the strategic goals of China’s overseas investments is to boost soft power (Deborah &
Tang, 2012). The investments in media and education areas are more directed to this goal than
those in other areas as soft power essentially relies on attractiveness of ideas, culture, values, and
image (Nye, 2004). Trump administration viewed China as a major challenging competitor and
recognized China’s intention of shaping a world antithetical to the US values and interests (The
White House, 2017). And Wanda’s investments in Hollywood have caused concerns in the US
public sector (Wong, 2016).
Whitewashing
Whitewashing is an important concept in the study of racism. It “refers to both the process and
works within a loose problematic of racialization,” in which the focal point manifests “on the con-
struction of white racialized identities” (Gabriel, 1998, p. 4). Whitewashing has come to be promi-
nent in many fronts, such as workplace, education, and film, in the multiracial and democratic
societies (Brown et al., 2003; Reitman, 2006). In the filmmaking practice, whitewashing first refers
to the act of selecting white actors to portray non-white roles. This practice started as early as the
beginning of 1900s when motion pictures were produced without sound. In D.W. Griffith’s (1915)
“Birth of a Nation,” many white actors played the roles of black savages. This practice is known as
“blackface,” which is “a style of theatrical makeup that originated in the United States, and is used
to make an actor look like a black person, but in a very exaggerated way” (“Blackface,” 2008, para.
1). Black people were not the only victims of this practice. White actors also played the roles of
other race/ethnicity groups: Latinos were portrayed through “brownface;” Asians were portrayed
through “yellowface;” and indigenous people were portrayed through “redface.” This practice has
endured harsh criticisms from film critics and become persistent in the contemporary film industry.
The recent example is Cameron Crowe’s (2015) “Aloha,” in which the white actress Emma Stone
played Captain Allison Ng, a character of Asian descent.
Scholars noted that the inequality of culture representation and racial stereotypes are also the
essential dimensions of whitewashing. A study performed by University of Southern California
(USC) found that only 23.7% of all speaking characters in the 500 top-grossing movies released
between 2007 and 2012 were minorities (Keegan, 2013), even though the minority population
consists of 40% of US population (“Hollywood Diversity,” 2017). Even in these speaking roles,
minority characters are commonly portrayed according to undesirable stereotypes, and are mar-
ginalized with flat and uninteresting storylines. (Kai, 2016). Latinos are portrayed as laziness or
criminality; Asians are portrayed as duplicity and untrustworthiness; Native Americans are por-
trayed as drunken or savage (Behnken & Smithers, 2015). Even in the “sympathetic” films such
as Kevin Costner’s (1990) “Dances with Wolves,” in which actual Native Americans were casted
to portray emotionally complex characters, the narrative was still focused on the white man’s
adventures and misfortunes (Churchill, 1998). On the other hand, Caucasians play a dominant
role in the cinematic representation. USC’s study estimated that 76.3% of all speaking characters
in the 500 top-grossing movies were white (Keegan, 2013). Caucasian actors are written as char-
acters with ranging personalities, and most of the heroic characters have been played by them.
6 Global Media and China
This Hollywood practice has not been changed over a century. As Sirota (2013) noted, in the last
quarter-century, 10 white savior films have received major Hollywood award nominations, with
half of those coming in just the last 5 years.
Scholars investigated the causes of whitewashing in the filmmaking practices. Ginneken (2007)
observed that most of the filmmakers in Hollywood come from Anglophone settler states, their
former colonial heartland, Great Britain, and other four larger countries on the European continent.
They are full of good intentions but have limitations in their cosmopolitan worldviews. The stereo-
types of minorities have remained unchallenged in their minds as well as their filmmaking prac-
tices. Denzin (2002) argued that as the racist system of cinematic representation has been prevailed
for a long time, it is difficult to break the system after it becomes the norm.
Scholars argued that Eurocentrism is the underlying force of whitewashing in the filmmaking.
Shohat and Stam (1994) defined Eurocentrism as “the procrustean forcing of cultural heterogeneity
into a single paradigmatic perspective in which Europe is seen as the unique source of meaning, as
the world’s center of gravity, as ontological ‘reality’ to the rest of the world’s shadow” (pp. 1–2).
Holtzman (2000) stated that Eurocentrism is “so thoroughly immersed in popular culture that its mes-
sages and values seem ‘normal’ to us as well” (p. 212). Having been cultivated by these messages and
values, many Americans look things through a Eurocentric perspective, where anything other than a
Caucasian is deemed “The Other,” which always has a negative or inferior connotation. This
Eurocentric worldview shapes not only the practices of filmmakers but also the consumption of films.
American moviegoers want to watch the films that reinforce their belief of Eurocentrism. If a film
contradicts Americans’ predispositions, it would not be successful in box office.
Nevertheless, whitewashing faces challenges not only from the harsh criticisms of critics but
also from the change of demographics in the US society. In 2015, minority population already
consisted of 38.4% of the US population. Hollywood cannot ignore the demands of this huge
minority population. Actually, filmmakers have adjusted their casting strategy by increasing minor-
ity actors. Hope (2013) noted that the percentage of minority actors of Oscar Best Picture Nominees
has increased to 15% during the period of 2000–2011 from 0.4% during the period of 1940–1950.
And this changing strategy generates more box office revenue. A recent study showed that for the
25 movies with 21%–30% of the cast being minorities in 2015, the median box office net profit
stood at US$105 million. Meanwhile, the 64 movies with only 10% or less minorities in their cast
had median box office earnings of only US$41.9 million in the same period (General, 2017).
The discourse of “The Great Wall” in Chinese media
“The Great Wall” initiated a passionate discourse among Chinese moviegoers and scholars. They
expressed different opinions and debated with each other in various media platforms. There were
235,862 people who commented on this film at Douban. The moviegoers and critics also had com-
ments on other social media platforms such as Tecent Dajia and Sina Weibo. Their comments
varied from the most upbeat to extremely negative. Chinese scholars’ attitudes toward this film
were also mixed, paralleling with those of moviegoers.
The positive comments were focused on the film’s significance for Chinese film industry. In
particular, as this film is the first Hollywood–China coproduction blockbuster directed by Chinese
director, it is a valuable experiment for Chinese film industry to garner international appeal (Yan,
2017). If it is successful, more Chinese directors, actors, and other cinematic professionals would
have more opportunities to work with Hollywood studios. And this would promote the production
standards and qualities of Chinese films (W. Zhang, 2016). The positive comments were also from
Zhang 7
the implications of and tactics employed by this film for exporting Chinese culture through the
platform of Hollywood (Yang, 2016; B. Zhang, 2017). Nevertheless, the criticisms were also
focused on the presentations of Chinese culture in this film. Some scholars argued that various
Chinese elements, such as Chinese drums, Kongming lanterns, and Shaanxi opera, were awk-
wardly imbedded into the thin plot, making this film lack of artistic value even under the banner of
exporting Chinese culture (Liu, 2017; D. Zhou, 2017). Chinese scholars acknowledged the signifi-
cant role of film industry in a nation’s soft power and related Zhang Yimou’s efforts of exporting
Chinese culture to China’s national strategy (Deng, 2017; K. Yang & Hao, 2017; Y. Zhang, 2016).
Whitewashing is not a major theme in the discourse. But a few critics mentioned it and viewed it
as a tactic of pandering to Western audiences (Xu, 2017; Yi, 2016).
Although Legendary was purchased by Wanda, most Americans still view the productions of
Legendary as Hollywood movies since Legendary is one of Hollywood legacy studios. Many of them
would not know this purchase because it was not a high-profile event in the US media. For those read
the relevant news, they would probably read the quotation of the founder of Legendary Thomas Tull
that Wanda would not exercise any control over Legendary’s creative content (C. Sun, 2016). The
analysis of the US media coverage on “The Great Wall” has the implications for Chinese filmmakers
as they are making great efforts to export Chinese culture to the US market. This study explored the
major themes imbedded in the US media coverage of this film and discussed the connections among
them using the grounded theory approach. Moreover, based on the review of literature and the dis-
course of this film in Chinese media, the following two specific research questions were proposed:
RQ1. How did the US media portray the China-Hollywood relationship in the coverage of “The
Great Wall” film?
RQ2. What was the overall tone of the US media coverage on “The Great Wall” film? On what
aspects it was reported more positively? And on what aspects it was reported more
negatively?
Method
News sample selection
LexisNexis Academic was used as the news database to obtain news reports about the US media
coverage of “The Great Wall” film. The news was searched using “Legendary” and “The Great
Wall” as the keywords in the headline and lead paragraph (HLEAD) at the end of June 2017. Total
134 news articles were downloaded. The author filtered the articles not published by the US media,
and then removed the articles not related to “The Great Wall” film and redundancies. The remain-
ing 38 news articles were used for analysis. The majority of these articles were from The New York
Times, a flagship daily newspaper in the United States, and The Hollywood Reporter, the most
influential news magazine focusing on Hollywood film industry.
Coding approach
The grounded theory approach that involves open coding, axial coding, and selective coding was
employed to identify the themes (Becker & Stamp, 2005). Two coders (the author and another
coder) worked together to conduct open coding, which identified the idea units based on the same
or similar ideas. To build the consensus of the coding, each coder coded independently news
8 Global Media and China
articles that were randomly selected from the news sample, and discussed their coding work to find
out the similarities and differences. This coding process was repeated until all news articles were
open coded. In the next stage of coding, the author did axial coding in which the codes were identi-
fied by grouping idea units based on the same or similar ideas (Corbin & Strauss, 1990), and cre-
ated 39 codes. In the following stage, inter-coder reliability test was conducted. Each coder used
these codes to separately code five news articles (13% of the news sample) randomly selected from
news sample. Inter-coder reliability was tested using the percentage of agreement, which was
lower than 90% in the first round. Two coders independently coded other five news articles ran-
domly selected using the same codes. The percentage of agreement in the second round test was
over 90%. Then, the coders separately coded the remaining 33 articles. Finally, the author did the
selective coding through which the codes were grouped into categories, and categories were
grouped into major themes.
Results
Table 1 reported the codes, categories, and major themes, as well as the counts and percentages of
codes. Three major themes and nine categories were created from 39 codes that were identified 395
times in the news sample. The first major theme was business, which consisted of the following seven
categories: “film performance,” “co-production,” “pandering,” “Hollywood’s business in China,”
“China’s film market,” “Legendary business,” and “Wanda business.” “Film performance” had six
codes that denoted different tonalities of the two aspects of performance: box office and review.
These six codes were identified 51 times (12.9% of the total counts) in the news sample.
“Co-production” had 11 codes that described various aspects of “co-production” between Hollywood
and China. These codes were identified 173 times (43.8% of the total counts) in the news sample.
“Pandering” had five codes that reflected various aspects of pandering and different tonalities toward
this issue. These codes were identified 18 times (4.6% of the total counts) in the news sample.
“Hollywood’s business in China” had two codes that represented Hollywood’s business interests and
strategies in China. These codes were identified 36 times (9.1% of the total counts) in the news sam-
ple. “China’s film market” had four codes that described four aspects of China’s market. These codes
were identified 34 times (8.6% of the total counts) in the news sample. “Legendary business” had
three codes that denoted three aspects of the studio’s business. These codes were identified 10 times
(2.5% of the total counts) in the news sample. “Wanda business” had two codes that emphasized
Wanda’s global strategies in film industry and its investments in Hollywood. These codes were iden-
tified 16 times (4.1% of the total counts) in the news sample.
The business theme was the dominant theme as it consisted of 7 categories and 33 codes, which
were identified 333 times (85.6% of the total counts) in the news sample. Another major theme was
soft power, which consisted of one category: China’s soft power strategy. And the third major
theme was whitewashing, which consisted of one category: whitewashing. The soft power theme
consisted of three codes, which were identified 26 times (6.6% of the total counts) in the news
sample. The whitewashing theme consisted of three codes, which were identified 31 times (7.8%
of the total counts) in the news sample.
RQ1 asks how US media portrayed China–Hollywood relationship in the coverage of “The
Great Wall” film. It was found that the US media focused on four dimensions of China-Hollywood
relationship: co-production, pandering, Hollywood’s business in China, and China’s film market.
The US media highlighted multiple aspects of co-production, such as cast, crew, script, investment,
and distribution of this film. Moreover, “The Great Wall” was portrayed as a bellwether/model/test
Zhang 9
Table 1. Codes, categories, and major themes in the US media coverage of “The Great Wall” film.
Category Code Count %
Business Film performance Box office success 7 1.77%
Box office not success 13 3.29%
Box office neutral 10 2.53%
Positive review 2 0.51%
Negative review 18 4.56%
Neutral review 1 0.25%
Co-production Cast 21 5.32%
Crew 31 7.85%
Investment 22 5.57%
Script/story 25 6.33%
Distribution 6 1.52%
Bellwether/model/test 13 3.29%
Other aspects 1 0.25%
Other “co-production” projects 11 2.78%
Hope/optimism 12 3.04%
Difficulty/challenge 12 3.04%
Zhang’s success/style/philosophy 19 4.81%
Pandering Reverse whitewashing 3 0.76%
Accommodating Chinese government
and audiences
2 0.51%
Accommodating audiences outside China 2 0.51%
Critique 5 1.27%
Support 6 1.52%
Hollywood’s
business in China
Hollywood’s interests in China 22 5.57%
Hollywood business strategies in China 14 3.54%
China’s film Market Market size and growth 15 3.80%
Diversity 2 0.51%
Uncertainty 3 0.76%
System, rules and regulations 14 3.54%
Legendary business Legendary leadership 7 1.77%
Legendary finance 2 0.51%
Legendary business strategy 1 0.25%
Wanda business Wanda business strategy 9 2.28%
Wanda investments in Hollywood 7 1.77%
Soft power China’s soft power
strategy
China’s ambition 1 0.25%
Chinese investments in Hollywood 2 0.51%
Chinese elements/values/themes 23 5.82%
Whitewashing Whitewashing Critique 13 3.29%
No such a thing 12 3.04%
Not a concern in China 6 1.52%
for many other ongoing “co-production” projects, a point mentioned frequently in the news cover-
age. Although the challenges and difficulties of the co-production were mentioned frequently, the
hope and optimism were also equally mentioned. This indicated that the US media adopted a sup-
portive attitude toward the co-production strategy between Hollywood and China.
10 Global Media and China
The US media also highlighted the pandering theme. They mentioned that the strategy of only
dropping Chinese actors into roles not meaningful to the plot did not work very well. The examples
of this strategy included the roles of Chinese actress Li Bingbing and the Chinese Olympic boxer
Zou Shiming in “Transformers: Age of Extinction,” and the role of Chinese actress Angelababy in
“Independence Day: Resurgence.” This strategy was criticized by Chinese critics and audiences.
Chinese audiences’ desire to see more meaningful roles played by Chinese actors in Hollywood
blockbusters pushes Hollywood to create larger roles for Chinese actors (Schwartzel, 2016).
Hollywood’s modified pandering strategy provides more opportunities for Chinese actors to enter
this world-leading movie production system. For example, Donnie Yen starred in the latest Star
Wars film “Rogue One” and “XXX: The Return of Xander Cage,” and made a big splash in
Hollywood (M. Lee, 2017). “The Great Wall” is another example of Hollywood’s modified pan-
dering strategy as the majority of roles were played by Chinese actors and the story was a Chinese
story. The US media neutrally viewed pandering as a tactic for Hollywood to enter China’s market,
and “The Great Wall” was a successful model of this tactic.
Hollywood’s interests and successes in China and its connections with China were frequently
mentioned in the US media, so did China’s fast-growing film market. This content provided the
endorsement for Hollywood’s strategies of co-production and pandering. China’s huge and rapidly
growing film market has tremendous attraction to Hollywood studios. To capture a big chunk of
this huge market, they applied pandering tactic and modified this tactic to further satisfy the wants
of Chinese government and audiences. It was also mentioned that co-production is also the strategy
of Hollywood to circumvent the quota limitation.
RQ2 inquires the overall tone, as well as different tonalities on various aspects, of “The Great
Wall” in the US media coverage. Under business theme, there were two categories that had codes
reflecting tonalities. The “film performance” category had two codes reflecting positive tonality:
box office success and positive review; it also had two codes reflecting negative tonality: box
office not success and negative review. The sum of positive code counts was 9, and the sum of
negative code counts was 31. Obviously, the US media used more negative tone in reporting the
performance of “The Great Wall” film. The “pandering” category had one positive code: support
(6 counts), and one negative code: critique (5 counts). This finding indicated that the US media
used mixed tone in reporting the issue of pandering. The “whitewashing” category had two posi-
tive codes (“no such a thing” and “not a concern in China”) with total 18 counts, and had one nega-
tive code (critique) with 13 counts. This finding revealed that the US media used more positive
tone in the portrayal of the whitewashing issue. Overall, the US media used more negative tone (49
counts) than positive tone (33 counts) in reporting “The Great Wall” film.
The interconnections of three major themes
The business theme was a dominant theme in the US media coverage under which co-production
was a dominant category. These findings suggested that business aspects, especially the collabora-
tion between Hollywood and China, were the focus of the US media coverage of “The Great Wall”
film. Havens, Lotz, and Tinic (2009) argued, Hollywood studios are “both economic and cultural
institutions . . . both a site of artistic and social expression as well as a business concerned with the
maximization of markets and profits” (p. 249). The business interest is always in the top priorities
of Hollywood studios. Hollywood studios attempt to find feasible strategies to occupy larger share
of China’s huge market. And pandering and co-production are two new strategies Hollywood is
adopting. Although the negative reports on the box office in American market indicated that this
Zhang 11
biggest co-production film was not successful from an American’s perspective, the successful sto-
ries of box office in China suggested that Hollywood’s new strategies are feasible to capture
Chinese moviegoers.
The second major theme in the US media coverage of “The Great Wall” was soft power. As the
literature suggested, China suffers a severe deficit of soft power, and China’s political leaders made
great efforts to enhance China’s soft power. Wanda’s acquisitions in Hollywood were among the
prominent projects of Chinese investments in the US media industries. Although Wanda’s Chairman
Wang Jianlin said, “I am a businessman, my goal is to be successful in business” (“Chairman
Wang,” 2016), the US media noted the connection between Wanda’s business activities and China’s
national strategies, as well as Zhang Yimou’s purpose of exporting Chinese culture. Wanda’s
acquisitions have caused concerns about China’s propaganda controls on American media
(Swanson, 2016). The Washington Post even warned that Hollywood could become Beijing’s next
propaganda outlet (“Beijing’s Next Propaganda Outlet,” 2016). The analysis of this study showed
that the US media highlighted the Chinese elements in this film and connected it to China’s ambi-
tion of enhancing soft power.
Blechman (2004) argued that soft power is not deployed, shaped, or even guided in a meaningful
way by governments. Hollywood movie studios are not subsidized or supported by the US govern-
ment. They are commercial organizations with the bottom-line purpose of making profits. The domi-
nance of Hollywood movies in the world is driven by the economic forces, such as the economics of
scale of film production, and the talents and resources dedicated to film production in Hollywood
(Lowenstein & Merrill, 1990; Scott, 2002; Van Elteren, 2003). Thus, the soft power contributed by
Hollywood is the byproduct of the business of Hollywood. Chinese government is more intentionally
building China’s soft power as it has subsidized/supported the operations/investments in the media
and education projects overseas. Chinese companies and filmmakers aligned themselves with the
government’s strategy. Wanda intentionally invested in the film industry abroad. And Zhang Yimou
also intentionally exported Chinese culture through his film. In the literature of soft power, the con-
nection between business and soft power has not been highlighted. The US media coverage of the
Wanda’s acquisitions in Hollywood and Zhang Yimou’s efforts of exporting Chinese culture revealed
this connection.
Whitewashing is the third theme in the US media coverage. As revealed in the literature, it is an
enduring issue in the Hollywood cinematic practices, which has multi-dimensional connections
with the broad social issues of American society, such as racial stereotypes and Eurocentrism. The
critique of Whitewashing in “The Great Wall” film referred to the heroic role-played by Matt
Damon, a Caucasian Hollywood star, who lead a Chinese army to save China from dragons. It was
viewed as the Hollywood’s repeated practice of casting white actors in roles originally conceived
as nonwhite. And this film was criticized as perpetuating “the racist myth that only a white man can
save the world” (Strauss, 2017, p. 1).
Although a few Chinese critics mentioned the whitewashing issue in this film, the US media
quoted several times the argument of Zhang Yimou that there is no whitewashing issue in Chinese
society and filmmaking practice. The whitewashing theme was related to business theme because
this film was targeted to the global market, including North America, the current biggest film mar-
ket. Casting Caucasian actors was the marketing strategy for attracting the global moviegoers, espe-
cially those in the North America and European market. Zhang Yimou said, “we can’t make an
internationally successful film on our own. If we didn’t have Matt Damon, if we didn’t speak English
in the film, then it would just be a purely Chinese film” (Qin, 2017). This tactic was viewed by
several Chinese critics as pandering to Western audiences (Xu, 2017; Yan, 2017). The US media
12 Global Media and China
coverage and Chinese discourse on “The Great Wall” film revealed a double-pandering strategy
adopted by both Hollywood studios and Chinese filmmakers in their co-production projects: To
pander to Chinese audiences’ desire of seeing more Chinese actors in Hollywood movies, Hollywood
studios create more meaningful Chinese characters for Chinese actors; To pander to Western audi-
ences’ feeling of superiority, Chinese filmmakers cast Caucasians as the central heroes. The negative
reports on the box office in the US market suggested that Chinese pandering strategy was not suc-
cessful. And the box office would have been even worse if the central hero was not a Caucasian
actor as it contradicts Americans’ predispositions (Havens et al., 2009). Obviously, the double-pan-
dering strategy employed in this film revealed the connection between whitewashing and business.
The Whitewashing theme was also related to soft power theme, although their connection was
more intricate than that between whitewashing and business. The literature suggested whitewash-
ing practice is rooted in Eurocentrism, a notion deeply embedded in American popular culture
(Holtzman, 2000). Caucasian heroes in Hollywood movies, and Matt Damon in “The Great Wall”
in particular, acted as the icons of Eurocentrism. Eurocentrism assumes the superiority of Western
culture values over other non-Western cultures, and these values work as a cure to all kinds of
problems (Pokhrel, 2011). The spread of the notion of Eurocentrism forces people in other socie-
ties to “rely on European ways of representation and concepts” (Heidegger, 1971, p. 15). The exist-
ence of Eurocentrism in China means that Chinese ideas about life’s meaning are ultimately being
evaluated by the culture values of the West (Kho, 2014). The hero played by Matt Damon repeated
the stereotyped metaphor of Hollywood movies that only Caucasians can save the world, and thus,
covertly reinforced the notion of Eurocentrism.
On the other hand, Eurocentrism imbedded in this film was compromised by the Chinese story
and elements. The film included enough the so-called Chinese elements, such as costumes, weap-
ons, and music. The secret black powder, which was searched by European mercenaries who
planned to take it to Europe, represented the innovation of ancient Chinese. More importantly, one
of the European mercenaries was re-educated by Chinese virtues of bravery, selflessness, and dis-
cipline, and finally became the hero who saved the world from the atrocious attack of alien mon-
sters. All these would create a positive image of ancient China and Chinese culture, which is
constructive to China’s soft power.
Conclusion
This study applied the grounded theory approach to analyze the US media coverage of “The Great
Wall” film. Three major themes were identified and discussed, and the media tone was evaluated.
The different tones on various aspects reflected the attitudes of the US media toward this film. The
interconnections of three major themes provided new theoretical angles to understand China–
Hollywood relationship.
It was found that the US media adopted a supportive attitude toward the co-production strategy
between Hollywood and China, and viewed pandering strategy as a marketing strategy for
Hollywood to enter Chinese market. Although more negative narratives were found at the overall
level, the US media also had many positive narratives on multiple aspects such as the box office
performance in China, pandering strategy of Hollywood, and whitewashing.
The discussions of three major themes revealed the dialectical dynamics among business, soft
power, and whitewashing. The co-production between China and Hollywood, as well as the
Chinese acquisitions in Hollywood, suggested the connection between business and soft power,
Zhang 13
and China’s strategy of using economic power to promote soft power. The double-pandering strat-
egy adopted by this film team reinforced this connection. While the pandering strategy of
Hollywood side seemed successful in seizing the market share in China, the pandering strategy of
Chinese side was not effective in capturing Western audiences. Whitewashing is not a social issue
in China. It was viewed as a pandering strategy of Chinese side. Chinese filmmakers intended to
employ this strategy to cater to Western audiences, and thus, export Chinese culture to Western
societies. Meanwhile, this strategy would help strengthen America’s soft power since it further
spreads the notion of Eurocentrism and reinforces the metaphor of “white heroes saving the world.”
As the biggest co-production film between Hollywood and China, “The Great Wall” acted as the
bellwether for many other ongoing co-production projects, and signaled a new stage of the coop-
eration between Hollywood and China. China and the United States are two super powers in the
contemporary world, competing with each other in multiple fronts including soft power. This study
revealed the complex and dialectical dynamics among business, soft power, and whitewashing,
which provided new perspectives to study China–Hollywood relationship, and had implications for
the film and soft power strategies of both countries.
Acknowledgement
The author would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable and constructive comments that
help substantially improve this paper, thank Amanda Lee for her coding work, and thank Professor Zhenqing
Sun for his help in searching Chinese articles.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
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Author biography
Dr. Xiaoqun Zhang’s research interests included media industry studies, the measurement of media coverage,
and the role of media in national development. His recent research was published in Communication Research,
Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, Telematics and Informatics, etc.
