Film-goer jolts distributor with lawsuit over Aftershock ads
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A movie-goer in northwest China is suing a cinema and the distributors of the box office hit "Aftershock," claiming excessive advertising wasted her time and violated her freedom of choice.
The suit filed by lawyer Chen Xiaomei has been accepted by the People's Court of Yanta District, Xi'an, capital of Shaanxi Province, said a statement from the court.
Chen, who saw the movie twice at the Xi'an Polybona International Cinema (Polybona), said in her suit that audiences were given no warning or indication on the ticket that ads before the film ran to 20 minutes.
As they did not know how long the commercials took, film-goers had to wait so as not to miss the movie, which wasted their time and violated their right to know and to choose, the suit said.
Chen is demanding the Polybona and Huayi Brothers Media Corporation, the film's copyright owner and distributor, refund her ticket price of 35 yuan (5.16 U.S. dollars), pay another 35 yuan in compensation and 1 yuan for emotional damages.
She is also seeking a written apology.
She also advised the cinema to state clearly the advertisement times on its website, in the lobby or on its customer hotline, and requested Huayi Brothers shorten the commercials time to less than five minutes.
"Aftershock," which tells the story of an earthquake that devastated China's Tangshan City in 1976, had raked in a record 650 million yuan at the Chinese mainland box office as of Tuesday last week, according to a statement from Huayi Brothers issued Wednesday.
The tear-jerker, directed by Feng Xiaogang, surpassed the takings of "The Founding of a Republic," which earned 420 million yuan in 2009.
