‘Roma’s China Theatrical Release Date Set Via Estars, Arthouse Alliance

Alfonso Cuaron’s Oscar-winning Roma has been confirmed for a May 10 release in China via Estars. As Deadline previously reported, the film is going out on the Nationwide Alliance of Arthouse Cinemas network which includes approximately 3,897 screens. It is not yet clear how many screens Roma will access, but the Middle Kingdom release could effectively be the widest play the film will have had theatrically.

This has been a bumper year for Oscar winners in China with Best Picture laureate Green Book — which, like Roma, is backed by Participant Media — grossing over $71M in the market to date. An edited version of Fox’s four-time Academy Award winner Bohemian Rhapsody further had a Middle Kingdom run that began in late March as an arthouse release before expanding wider. It grossed $14.6M.

Roma hits Chinese cinemas the same day as Warner Bros’ Detective Pikachu and amid the ongoing run of Avengers: Endgame. Cuaron’s highly personal black-and-white love letter to the women who raised him currently has an 8.1 on Chinese reviews aggregator Douban. The director has history with wide audiences in the market where Gravity grossed $71M back in 2013.

Produced by Esperanto Fillmoj and Participant Media, Roma won Oscars for Best Director, Best Cinematography and Best Foreign Language Film. It was released in the rest of the world by Netflix, becoming available on the platform on December 14 after a theatrical release that began on November 21 in the U.S and Mexico, as well as expanding to other cinemas in over 40 countries. It is still playing theatrically in nine countries including Japan and Italy.