ONE of China’s most famous film directors publicly accused the country’s richest man Friday of monopolizing the cinema market and limiting screenings of his latest movie.

    Feng Xiaogang’s film “I Am Not Madame Bovary,” which opened Friday, has been given slots in 40 percent of the available screening times in rival cinemas, but only 10.9 percent at Wanda Cinema Line’s theaters.

    In an open letter to Wanda chairman Wang Jianlin, Feng said that the real-estate-to-entertainment conglomerate had become a “monopoly” in China that was on track to “buy up Hollywood” and was acting unfairly to scupper the chances of his highly anticipated social satire.

    He suggested that Wanda had limited the screenings of his film because they were angry that a Wanda manager had recently been poached by the production company behind Feng’s latest film, Huayi Brothers. Feng is also a shareholder in the company.

    The black comedy starring Fan Bingbing, was lauded for “its ambitious rendering of a woman’s Kafkaesque struggle as she takes on the Chinese legal system” at the Toronto International Film Festival, and sees A-list star Fan as a cafe owner caught in a bureaucratic maze after she is swindled by her ex-husband.

    Originally scheduled for release Sept. 30, Feng’s black comedy finally hit cinema screens Friday.

    Wang’s son, Wanda board member Wang Sicong, fired back in a Weibo posting that Feng’s film was simply not good enough and should instead “present a work that can speak for itself.”

    Wanda Group, a real estate conglomerate, has moved into entertainment, buying Hollywood studio Legendary Entertainment and dick clark productions.

    By some estimates, Wanda Group already holds about 18 percent of the country’s screens, making it the largest exhibitor. Wanda Cinemas’ CEO Zeng Maojun indicated Nov. 14 the company intends to add a further 150 theaters this year.

    It’s not the first time the two companies have been at loggerheads over film screenings. In July, Wanda only arranged the bare minimum of screenings for rival Huayi Brother’s animated feature “Rock Dog.”

    Industry watchers speculate that the reason for the underwhelming screening arrangement is Wanda’s way of exacting revenge on Huayi Brothers for successfully poaching executive Jerry Ye from them in March.

    (SD-Agencies)