Hollywood's sci-fi action movie Transformers has lit up cinemas across China, 20 years after the debut of its cartoon in the nation. Cinema managers expect this film will send box office sales through the roof thanks to the everlasting enthusiasm of nostalgic Chinese fans that once grew with the toys and cartoons.

Inspired by the Hasbro toy line, the Transformers television cartoon series was created in 1984 to promote the toys. They are fictional alien robots from the planet Cybertron and are able to "transform" their bodies into items such as a car, aircraft, animal, and more. Two years ago, Pearl Harbor director Michael Bay was invited by film mogul Steven Spielberg to direct a US$150-million live-action Transformers movie.

When the film was released a week ago during the United States' Independence Day holiday season, Transformers collected an amazing US$155.4 million in its first week and became one of the fastest-grossing blockbusters of all time as a non-sequel.

Armed with the good news, Chinese cinema managers are hopeful this movie will be a huge smash this summer since the toy-fiction has a strong and large fan base in China. Gao Jun, general manager of Beijing New Film Association, told the Star Daily yesterday that he estimated Transformers' box office result would likely outpace Spider-Man 3, which has successfully amassed 150 million yuan (US$19.8 million) since its release in May.  

"It is the biggest event in this year's film market," Gao Jun said, "the number of film copies is about 600, more than any foreign films ever screened in China." Industry insiders agreed and indicated that Transformers have a heavy influence on those who were born in the 1970s and 1980s, so the film can possibly even generate 200 million yuan (US$26.4 million) in China.

But Hasbro and other businesses have their eyes on the emerging merchandise market.

The Blue Paper of Chinese Culture 2007, released by Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in February, suggested that ancillaries from the cartoon franchise had earned 5 billion yuan (US$661 million) from Chinese youngsters' pockets in the past two decades.

To promote the film, director Michael Bay also launched his Chinese-language website on Tuesday. According to the Beijing Times, the director said he was very happy to launch his Chinese website (www.mtime.com/my/michaelbay), through which he can talk about his work and his thoughts with fans in China. The official site includes details about the director, film, and director's diary.

"Autobots, transform, and roll out!"

Transformers are burned in the memories of a generation in China. In 1987, Hasbro gave the cartoon series to Shanghai Television to broadcast for free, in order to open the Chinese toy market. When the first three seasons were aired in China, the cartoon was very well received by young audiences. In many fans' hearts, it became a classic, along with the voices of those veteran Chinese vocal contributors.

"Even the opening introduction of the cartoon sounded so good for me," Shi Hang, a Chinese student from Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium, told the latest News Magazine, "I was seven when I first saw the robot cartoon, and I was in awe. How fantastic it was! I made sure to get home early every day to see it at 6 PM from that day on."

"People who are crazy for this film are actually not the kids, but those who were born in the late 1970s or the early 1980s. Now many of them have families and children, " a woman surnamed Li told Shanghai-based Youth Daily. She has joined in a fan group that swept the first screening tickets. "We went to see the movie together because we want to find a cause to get back to the good old days."

What were those days like? Children packed in a small room, watching the Transformers battling on the black and white TV screen. At that time, the Chinese people had just opened to the outside world, so anything fresh and cool in their eyes was a miracle.

The Hasbro toys officially entered China's market in the same year (1987) and soon got fans hooked. Anyone back at that time who possessed a toy of Transformers would be regarded as a hero among his fellow little friends. "We were all crazy for the Transformers toys," Cheng Kai, a Shanghai mobile phone designing engineer born in the 1970s, said. He would save money for three months and cried and cried for his parents' funding to buy a Transformers' toy.

Xia Yu, a famous Chinese actor who starred in a series of movies like The Painted Veil, may be one of the biggest fans in China. He told the News Magazine that the Transformers cartoon was the first cartoon led by robot characters that Chinese kids had ever saw. "I remember once at that time, every boy screamed 'Autobots, transform and roll out! ' in the streets. "

Xia has collected over 300 Transformers toys. He said when he first heard the news about the Transformers film project, he was happy. But when he saw some trailers, he found that the Transformers had new designs. "I was a bit confused, but I still highly anticipate it and will certainly go to the movie."

The midnight screenings were held at various cinemas nationwide, with fans exhibiting their toy collections and movie stars Xia Yu, Shao Bing, Xu Zheng, Tao Hong and more attending sold-out premieres in every Chinese city.

In most places, the midnight screening results are far better than any other imported foreign blockbusters and even surpass the results of the hugely successful Chinese film Curse of the Golden Flower by Zhang Yimou, so that most cinema managers had to add more and more screening halls to meet fans' demands, then sold out of them all.

Industry observers all estimated this film would set several new box office records in China, when thousands of Chinese fans cheered, cried, and applauded last night for Optimus Prime and his fellow Autobots who came alive on big screen, a scene that seldom happens among conservative Chinese audiences.

(China.org.cn by Zhang Rui July 11, 2007)