China’s latest cash cow is a clunky cartoon bull
cash cow: the part of a business that always makes a profit and that provides money for the rest of the business
Why “Niu Lai” has become a box-office hit
used to describe how successful a film, play, or actor is, by the number of people who pay to see them 票房〔指电影、戏剧或演员能吸引多少人来观看〕
TO MANY grown-ups, the cartoon film “Niu Lai” would be 86 minutes of torture. Yet in recent days cinemas across China have been packed with older audiences happily enduring its crudely animated depiction of a bullock’s dream about motherly love and threatening predators. No matter that the film is excruciatingly slow-paced, with long seconds of silence as its characters merely blink. On a typical day in late August earnings at the box office were the seventh highest in China, just behind a new Hollywood blockbuster, “Spider-Man: Brand New Day”. The cartoon has become a meme-driven frenzy.
Western audiences have turned trashy films into cult classics: “The Room”, an American film released in 2003, became so notorious for its bad acting and appalling script and set design that audiences flocked to see it for laughs.
very popular with a particular group of people; treating sb/sth as a cult figure, etc. 受特定群体欢迎的；作为偶像崇拜的
a cult movie/book
风靡一时的电影／书
The singer has become a cult figure in America.
那位歌手在美国已成为人们狂热崇拜的偶像。
The cartoon has achieved cult status.
这部动画片达到了风靡一时的地步。
The TV series has a cult following among young people.
那部电视连续剧在年轻人中拥有一批狂热的追随者。
to go or gather together somewhere in large numbers 群集；聚集；蜂拥
+ adv./prep.
Thousands of people flocked to the beach this weekend.
这个周末有好几千人蜂拥到了海滩。
Huge numbers of birds had flocked together by the lake.
大群的鸟聚集在湖边。
~ to do sth
People flocked to hear him speak.
人们成群结队地去听他演讲
Set design is the art of creating the physical surroundings, background scenery, and overall visual environment where a story takes place for theater, film, television, or live events. It is also known as scenic design or stage design.
“Niu Lai”, which is the bullock’s name (it means “the bull is coming”), has a similar attraction: a copy of it on YouTube, apparently filmed in a Chinese cinema with a mobile phone, drew more than 1.1m views before being deleted. The chuckles of the Chinese audience (the film is not supposed to be funny) are clearly audible.
Yet in a country where, unlike in Western countries, the government plays a big role in making, financing and shaping the narratives of films, the popularity of “Niu Lai”—an independent production by a mother-and-son team on a shoestring budget—is a remarkable phenomenon. Young people have flooded China’s social media with comments that often go beyond mere catcalling. On Weibo, one of the most popular platforms, posts with the hashtag “Niu Lai” have been viewed more than 170m times: well over the count (100m) for the hashtag of China’s currently hottest movie: “Once Upon a Time in the Middle East”. That one is a big-budget state-backed film that officials have been organising people to watch because of its heart-warming tale of a Chinese cook’s heroism amid a destructive American invasion of an Iraq-like country.
back : verb [T] ~ sb/sthto give help or support to sb/sth 帮助；支持
Her parents backed her in her choice of career.
她父母支持她的职业选择。
Doctors have backed plans to raise the tax on cigarettes.
医生们对提高烟草税计划给予了支持。
The programme of economic reform is backed (= given financial support) by foreign aid.
经济改革计划得到外资援助。
a United Nations-backed peace plan
得到联合国支持的和平计划
Despite deliberate seat-packing, the number-one film does appear to be genuinely popular. But online commenters use “Niu Lai” in order to poke at the industry’s pouring money into films that aim to spread the Communist Party’s messages; they use star actors but are often second-rate.
[T] ~ sth + adv./prep.to push sth somewhere or move it in a particular direction with a small quick movement 推；捅；戳；探
He poked his head around the corner to check that nobody was coming.
他从转角处探出头来，查看有没有人过来。
Someone had poked a message under the door.
有人从门底下塞进了一张纸条。
Don’t poke her eye out with that stick!
别让那根棍子戳着她的眼睛！
Viewers carp at online censors’ habit of suppressing negative views of these party-backed extravaganzas. “Anyone can point at ‘Niu Lai’ and call it trash,” wrote one Weibo user to his more than 1.5m followers, echoing a commonly expressed view. “But those beautifully packaged, mega-budget super-flops in the film industry—are we even allowed to criticise them?…Absolutely not. That’s why they aren’t even as good as ‘Niu Lai’.”
Discomfiting though such commentary must be for officials, the phenomenon may have upsides for the government. Some netizens have poached the cartoon’s imagery to produce mini-videos suggesting that a bull run in the stock market is on its way. Officials love to promote optimism about the country’s faltering economy. Amid the bull craze, censors are standing back.