Promotional material for Encanto and Chhichhore (top) Photos: Courtesy of Douban

 The first Hollywood film to be released in Chinese mainland theaters in 2022, Disney's Encanto did not make a big wave during its opening weekend, but it did defeat the other new foreign language film, Indian film Chhichhore, at the box office.

According to the ticketing platform Maoyan, the animated Encanto once topped the most-anticipated list among the 11 movies that were released on Friday, demonstrating that the world's largest film market still has a place for Disney' family- orientated animated films. 

Amid the COVID-19 global pandemic, Encanto's happy and warm story is just what audiences need as people want to find an entertaining way to relax and rid themselves of the worries about real life. 

Disney is taking advantage of its strengths by producing films that seek to soothe people's hearts, just like Soul, which was released in the Chinese mainland in late 2020. Though there was not a lot of marketing or promotion around Soul before its release, it performed very well at the box office by relying on a good story and solid word-of-mouth among Chinese moviegoers. According to Maoyan, the film pulled in an impressive 376 million yuan ($59 million) at the Chinese mainland box office.  

However, while Soul earned a high score of 8.7/10 on Chinese media review platform Douban, Encanto only has a 6.5/10 score.

Maoyan shows that Encanto had grossed an estimated 17.53 million yuan as of Sunday afternoon while Chhichhore had grossed 8.83 million yuan. However, these two newly released foreign language films were not able to surpass the top three Chinese films, Embrace Again, Another Me and G Storm, which were screened in theaters during the New Year holiday. 

Encanto's scenes are beautiful, but the film seems to lack some fresh and exciting elements that can touch audiences' hearts. Many Chinese audience reviews commented that some of the plots in the film didn't make sense, while the number of English musical might be a bit hard for many Chinese moviegoers to understand.

As the first Hollywood film was released in China in 2022, Disney's Encanto has a certain symbolic meaning - Hollywood remains China's main source of foreign language films, and it  still has eyes on the world's largest film market. 

The film's director Byron Howard tweeted on Saturday to celebrate the film's debut in the Chinese mainland.

"Created this to celebrate the opening of Encanto in China and to thank our Chinese fans. Hope fans in China enjoy the magic and color of Encanto!" he wrote on Twitter.