WHEN this year’s Golden Globes gala was telecast live for the first time in the country by Hunan Satellite Channel’s Hunantv.com, millions of mostly young viewers logged on, showing the country’s love of Western TV and film.

    “Boyhood” became the biggest talking point in China. The film has been shown since August on major Chinese video websites like iQiyi.com. It has been viewed more than 1.1 million times on Tencent Video.

    Nearly 43,600 users of China’s largest film-review site Douban.com rated it 8.6 out of 10.

    Shanghai University film studies graduate Liu Xinpei is excited about the proliferation of such online video sites.

    The suspense-movie fan, who adores director Danny Boyle, constantly tracks film festivals and reads about award winners and new releases. But most aren’t screened in Chinese cinemas, are expensive to order on DVD from overseas and are difficult to pirate since many illegal download sites have been shut down.

    Video sites offer an expanding bank of movies like “Boyhood” that she can watch for as little as 5 yuan (US$81 cents). She appreciates the coming-of-age story’s incorporation of pop songs to ensure fluid transitions, she says.

    Four Golden Globe nominees are available on iQiyi, including “The Theory of Everything” and “Maps to the Stars.”

    Others, such as “Birdman,” “Foxcatcher” and best foreign film-winner “Leviathan,” will soon appear on the site.

    Indeed, Chinese video sites have long shown Western films. But previously these films had long beforehand been released on DVD. It wasn’t until 2012 that the sites, with Tencent Video leading the way, began streaming new releases.

    Users can watch these films multiple times within 48 hours for about 5 yuan.

    Streaming sites’ abundance of foreign films is a game changer, since the number of foreign films that can be screened in cinemas a year is legally limited to 34.

    Websites are subjected to less rigorous official scrutiny and box office pressure. This affords for not only more foreign films but more diverse genres, such as horror and art-house flicks.

    Anticipated productions like “The Hangover 3” and best-picture Oscar winner “Argo” were widely viewed online by Chinese shortly after their U.S. releases.

    Chinese streaming sites are reaching out to the U.S.’ best production houses.

    Tencent is cooperating with Disney companies, including Marvel Entertainment and Pixar Animation Studios.

    By working with Hollywood’s “big six,” iQiyi.com licenses over 2,000 movies a year.

    Foreign films account for nearly half of the website’s total stock and covers “pretty much every genre the audiences could want,” iQiyi’s senior vice president Yang Xianghua says.

    International festivals also offer opportunities for Chinese video websites to approach brand new productions, iQiyi CEO Gong Yu tells U.S. entertainment trade magazine Variety.

    As the main sponsor of last year’s Venice International Film Festival, iQiyi was licensed to stream 23 nominations from previous festivals, including six award-winning Italian productions that ran exclusively on the video website.

    Gong says the website has established close, long-term relationships in Asia-Pacific and the United States, and is now looking for new collaborations in Europe.

    The producers of 30 films shown at June’s Shanghai International Film Festival authorized the site to stream the movies, including the festival’s winner, Greek director Pantelis Voulgaris’ “Little England.” It also streamed 20 films from the Hong Kong Summer International Film Festival.

    Movies account for about 60 percent of the content China’s online video viewers watch. And 60 percent of users watch films online at least once a week, a 2013 Audforce.com survey found.

    Yang from iQiyi says online cinema holds great potential. Only 30 percent of a film’s profits in the United States come from the box office. The rest flow from other modes of distribution, such as pay-per-view TV, DVDs and video websites.

    China doesn’t really have a DVD market or subscription TV channels. Streaming sites fill the void.

    In 2014, iQiyi’s registered members and revenues increased eightfold.

    “Profits are still just enough to cover licensing fees, not to mention labor,” Yang says. “But we’re still in the process of fostering the market. We’re not in a hurry to make more profit.”

    The only obstacle may be that, starting this year, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television requires online content to be registered and wholly reviewed before it’s certificated to be shown.

    “Our quota will surely still be much larger than cinemas’,” Yang says. “As far as I know, we’ll also be allowed to carry content intended to be exclusively for the Internet. I don’t think there will be much difference in content choices.” (SD-Agencies)

    1. A scene from “The Theory of Everything.”

    2. A poster for “Little England.”

    3-5. Posters for the award-winning “Boyhood,” “Leviathan” and “Argo.”

    6. A scene from “Foxcatcher.”

    File photos