China’s First AI Feature Flops, Months After Scrappy ‘Niu Lai’ Became A Box Office Hit

China’s first fully AI-generated theatrical feature, its producers claim, has flopped at the box office, perhaps reminding financiers that enthusiasm for the technology doesn’t necessarily translate into demand from moviegoers.

Estimates show that Bona Film Group’s Sanxingdui: Future Past earned just RMB1.21 million ($181,000) through Monday, after its October 23 debut. According to Bona, the science-fiction feature cost more than RMB10 million ($1.5 million) and required nearly 100 people working for over two years. More than 10,000 screenings were scheduled for opening day, giving it ample opportunity to find an audience.

Notably, the dismal launch comes two months after Chinese audiences embraced a very different animation curiosity in Niu Lai, a shoestring feature made by director Xin Yumeng and his mother, screenwriter Sun Lifang.

That film barely made a peep when it first hit theaters, earning roughly RMB7,700 ($1,150) during its first ten days after opening on August 5. But then clips of its crude modeling, stiff animation, and bizarre performances spread online. Its shortcomings became its charm, transforming an obscure production into a communal moviegoing experience with an oddly endearing pair of filmmakers behind it.

Niu Lai has now grossed RMB64.29 million, or nearly $10 million. A direct comparison of grosses is perhaps premature, given its own slow start, but its August breakout demonstrated that Chinese audiences would buy tickets to an animated film with almost none of the visual sophistication producers and distributors typically consider essential.

To be clear, we’re not claiming either film’s performance establishes a universal rule about audiences’ attitudes toward AI. Niu Lai benefited from initial mockery, memes, and curiosity as much as affection. Still, its eccentric humanness gave moviegoers something they wanted to experience together. Sanxingdui’s claim to represent a filmmaking breakthrough has proved considerably less compelling to audiences looking for movie magic.