Sandra Bullock as astronaut Ryan Stone floats above the Earth. Photo: CFP

Inset: Gravity director Alfonso Cuarón speaks with stars Bullock and George Clooney. Photo: Courtesy of Yingxing Tianxia Entertainment

Though titled Gravity, almost 90 percent of Alfonso Cuarón's sci-fi thriller is about two people surviving in an environment without this grounding force.

At its premiere on the Chinese mainland Tuesday, the film grossed 32 million yuan ($5.25 million), according to entertainment portal yule.sohu.com. Though lagging slightly behind the 40.1 million yuan Thor: The Dark World earned on its Friday, November 8, debut, it was an impressive showing for a weekday. Many insiders believe Gravity has a strong momentum heading into the following days to deliver a weekend performance that will match or beat Thor.

"Life of Pi, which ultimately made over 500 million yuan in the [Chinese] mainland, had a revenue of 13 million yuan on its first day," movie critic Wang Siwei noted.

Surrounded by an eager group of Chinese press, Mexican director Cuarón showed up in Beijing Monday to promote his new work. Like many Hollywood directors and actors who have started courting Chinese audiences, Cuarón greeted the press with "dajia hao" (hello, everybody) and introduced the Chinese title of the film, Di xin yin li.

Critical reception

Praised by Avatar director James Cameron as "the best space film ever done," Gravity tells the story of two US astronauts - mission specialist Dr Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) and veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) - after debris strikes their space shuttle and the International Space Station. With no way of communicating with Earth, they must find their own way home.

Different from Hollywood's typical 3D blockbusters, Gravity relies little on complex, effects-filled scenes. Most of the time, the vast void of the universe serves as the only backdrop. Though there are beautiful shots of Earth as seen from space, they are far less fantastical than the alien forests seen in Avatar or the scenes on the open water in Life of Pi.

Gravity will show in three formats: 2D, 3D and IMAX 3D. Cuarón said he thinks a giant screen plus 3D helps audiences get into the heads of the imperiled astronauts.

Though rated 9.1 out of 10 on Rotten Tomatoes and 8.5 out of 10 on IMDB, Gravity has received some critical commentary from audiences.

Li Bing, a moviegoer at the Tuesday premiere in Beijing, found the portrayal of, well, gravity to be inconsistent.

"The astronaut (Bullock as Stone) moves swiftly in the space capsule, but when she lands, the increased gravity seems to have little effect on her," she said.

Movie critic Zhao Xiangyu told the Global Times that even classic movies have their flaws. "It doesn't grab audiences at first, but it wows them slowly through the film," he said.

China's role in the film

Acknowledging the growing box office power of moviegoers in China, Hollywood blockbusters have been increasingly incorporating Chinese characters or elements in recent years. Sometimes a monetary exchange is behind these inclusions, but Cuarón said he brought China into the plot of Gravity of his own volition, no strings attached.

Tiangong, the first space station made by China, together with its Shenzhou spacecraft, plays an integral part in the fate of the US astronauts.

Inside Tiangong, audiences see small details of Chinese life - an ink and wash painting, a ping-pong paddle, a statue of Buddha. Even the operation panel is marked with Chinese characters, and when Bullock struggles to interpret the meaning of the characters, Chinese audiences may chuckle to themselves and say, "Now you realize the importance of learning Chinese."

Cuarón explained at Monday's press event that featuring Tiangong was not done to appease Chinese audiences or to improve box office sales, but rather because China's presence in space is a "reality."

"We had to consider what elements we have in space. It's limited," Cuarón told the Chinese media. "You have the Hubble space telescope and Tiangong and Shenzhou."

"Chinese technology is at the forefront," he added.

Bringing space to screen

With only two actors - the Oscar-winning duo of Bullock and Clooney - Cuarón's film makes the most of its compact cast.

Cuarón, whose childhood dream was to become an astronaut, explained that when he finished writing the screenplay with his son Jonás, he thought Gravity was going to be a simple movie which could be produced very quickly.

"Soon it became clear that the technology what we were trying to do didn't exist," said Cuarón, who is also known for directing another sci-fi film, Children of Men (2006). "We went on a whole journey of two and half years to figure out the technology."

To imitate the zero-gravity environment of space, the crew filmed many scenes inside a special LED light box, measuring 6 meters high and 3 meters wide, and equipped with camera rigs controlled by robot arms.

The light box had harnesses to keep the actors floating and light sources to imitate the appropriate shadows on the astronauts' faces, based on the placement of the sun and Earth in any given scene. The camera had the capability of swiveling 360 degrees, helping to create the illusion that the actors are floating.

Altogether, the film finished in four and half years.

Despite the high-tech apparatus involved in shooting and the aerospace jargon, Gravity still manages to never feel weighed down.