Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) became part of the picture across the 1960s, thanks in part to a well-publicised speech in which Mao appeared blasГ© about the prospect of nuclear war: it would, in essence, be a numbers game, with enough Chinese surviving to put together a post-apocalyptic socialist paradise. More important than political control in western Cold War filmmaking was money, and the power wielded by controversial lobby groups such as the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals вЂ“ launched in 1944 by the likes of Walt Disney and Ayn Rand with the stated aim of combatting Communist and Fascist infiltration. But nothing in America approached StalinвЂ™s personal vetting of film scripts, or the cranking out of socialist realism by a state film industry that only recovered after StalinвЂ™s demise. The FBIвЂ™s Los Angeles office took an active interest in the messages that Hollywood was sending out, fretting over ItвЂ™s a Wonderful Life (1946) for its negative portrayal of the banking industry and its tendency to harp on the problems of the вЂњcommon manвЂќ. In the 1940s and 1950s, the priorities for US and Soviet cinema were two-fold: to avoid infiltration by dangerous foreign ideas, and to project an image of life at home sufficiently sunny that no-one watching вЂ“ locally or abroad вЂ“ could be in any doubt as to whose political system was the more conducive to human flourishing.ДЄmerican filmmakers were never as tightly constrained as their Soviet counterparts.

But amidst heightened tensions and talk of a вЂњnew Cold WarвЂќ, ought we to be comparing not only ship and missile numbers, but cinema screens too вЂ“ ChinaвЂ™s 75,000 to AmericaвЂ™s 44,000?Д¬inemaвЂ™s role in the first Cold War offers clues as to where we might be headed. Set during the Korean War, and depicting Chinese troops going up against US-led United Nations forces, the film has now taken over $800 million (ВЈ580 million).Д®vidence for state-media claims that Lake Changjin is fostering sympathy abroad for China appears thin on the ground, given the objections, voiced everywhere from the United States to South Korea, about the filmвЂ™s pantomime-baddie approach to characterisation and its questionable handling of history. The extraordinary size of the Chinese market вЂ“ the product of increasing wealth and a cinema-building boom in recent years вЂ“ was revealed earlier this month by The Battle at Lake Changjin. The missionвЂ™s objective, however, makes it all worthwhile: access to the worldвЂ™s largest box office, after China overtook the United States last year.

Getting there has been an adventure in itself: a global pandemic, a blackout on foreign films during ChinaвЂ™s National Day holiday season and вЂ“ 007вЂ™s toughest test of all вЂ“ state regulators deciding which international films get one of the 34 coveted annual places for imported productions.

Tomorrow, the latest James Bond film, No Time To Die, finally makes its way into Chinese cinemas.

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