电影成就的文化折扣:奥斯卡金像奖与美国东亚票房

Cultural discount of cinematic achievement:the academy awards and U.S. movies' East Asian box office

本文借助奥斯卡金像奖来研究文化差异如何影响美国电影在东亚地区的接受过程。本研究延续了近期有关文化折扣的研究;研究者一般认为奥斯卡金像奖体现了电影的品质和成就,本文的研究重点则是电影品质的不同方面受到文化折扣的影响程度是否有所不同。具体来说,笔者区分了剧情类奖项和非剧情类奖项。研究结果表明,剧情类奖项与特定文化的联系更加紧密,因而其文化特异性更强,更容易受到文化差异引起的文化折扣影响。本文针对从2002年到2007年9个东亚国家或地区的电影市场上的585部美国电影进行了实证研究。研究结果表明,非剧情类奖项与票房成绩呈正相关关系,而剧情类奖项则与票房呈负相关关系,且在与美国文化差异越大的国家,这种负相关关系越明显。该实证研究的结果与笔者的理论推断是一致的。此外,本文还对本研究结果的其他意义进行了讨论。

This study uses the Academy Awards as a window to look into how cultural differences influence the reception of U.S.movies in East Asia.Following the recent research on the concept of cultural discount and the argument that the Academy Awards are indicators of cinematic qualities and achievement,the research questions focus on whether different types of cinematic qualities and achieve ment would be discounted by cultural differences to different extents.More specifically,a distinction between drama and non-drama awards is made,and it is argued that the cinematic qualities and achievement indicated by the drama awards are likely to be relatively more culturally specific and hence more likely to be discounted by cultural differences.The empirical analysis examines the box office performance of 585 U.S.movies from 2002 to 2007 in nine East Asian markets.It shows that non-drama awards relate positively to box office receipts,but drama awards relate negatively to box office receipts.Moreover,the negative relationship between drama awards and box office receipts is stronger in countries more culturally distant from the U.S.The findings are therefore highly supportive to the conceptual arguments.Other implications of the findings are also discussed.