LOS ANGELES, Oct. 13 (Xinhua) -- Two U.S. blockbusters produced in association with Chinese companies performed well at the North American box office, stepping into the top five this weekend.
Three-time Oscar award-winning filmmaker Ang Lee's action film "Gemini Man", a newcomer, opened in third at weekend box office with 20.5 million U.S. dollars in its debut weekend in North America, according to studio figures collected by measurement firm Comscore.
Directed by Lee and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, David Ellison, Dana Goldberg and Don Granger, the VFX-heavy film starring Will Smith follows Henry Brogan, an aging government assassin, who is suddenly targeted and pursued by a mysterious young operative that seemingly can predict his every move.
Lee won the Oscar award for best director twice, in 2013 for "Life of Pi" and in 2006 for "Brokeback Mountain." The martial arts film "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" directed by Lee won the Oscar for best foreign language film in 2001.
"Gemini Man" is distributed by Paramount Pictures in North America. It was produced by Skydance, in association with China's Fosun Pictures. Fosun Pictures and Alibaba Pictures are the co-financiers of the film.
The film received a modest "B+" rating from moviegoers on CinemaScore.
"We're very excited with the opportunity to work with Ang Lee. He is such a great director with a worldwide reputation and 'Gemini' is a one-of-a-kind character-driven action movie we've never seen before," said Li Haifeng, senior vice president and chief communications officer of Fosun International and chairman of Fosun Pictures, in a statement earlier this year, adding that Fosun is thrilled to work with the energetic and innovative teams of Skydance and Paramount Pictures.
"As a company rooted in China, Fosun is dedicated to telling the story of China with internationalized language and promoting cross-cultural communication between China and other countries," Li told Xinhua in a recent interview.
A U.S-China co-production, "Abominable," came in fourth place in its third weekend with 6.17 million dollars, pushing its North American cume to 47.97 million dollars through Sunday.
The animated family film is the co-production between the California-based DreamWorks Animation, a subsidiary of Universal Pictures, and the Shanghai-based Pearl Studios, formerly known as Oriental DreamWorks. It's released by Universal Pictures in North America.
Written and directed by Jill Culton and co-directed by Todd Wilderman, the film stars the voices of Chloe Bennet, Albert Tsai, Tenzing Norgay Trainor, Eddie Izzard, Sarah Paulson, Tsai Chin and Michelle Wong.
The animated adventure follows a Chinese teenage girl who encounters a Yeti on the rooftop of her Shanghai apartment building and embarks on an epic quest to reunite the magical creature with his family at the highest point on Earth, the majestic Himalayas.
