Asian movie theaters will be playing "I Am Legend", Will Smith's new science-fiction thriller. It seems China is the only one not playing this new movie.

This seems to be caused by the fact that China is trying to promote its own national movies and has been trying to diminish the flow of American movies and ban them at least temporarily.

Interviewed by reporters in Hong Kong, Will Smith stated: "We struggled very, very hard to try to get it to work out, but there are only a certain amount of foreign films that are allowed in."

Smith said he had met with China Film Group's chairman, Han Sanping, and is working with him to secure a release date for "I Am Legend."Moreover, other movie projects came up in the discussion between Will Smith and  Han Sanping. Smith told Han he was flirting with the idea of making a remake of "The Karate Kid" and that it was possible that the action would be set in Hong Kong or Beijing.

The release of "I am Legend" will however take place in Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, South Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand.

Hong Kong has remained quite an autonomous territory, although it was returned by Britain to China in 1997. Consequently, the territory has its own financial, legal and regulatory systems.

The  Hollywood trade publication Variety was the one to announce that American movies have been banned for three months by Chinese authorities in order to protect the local film industry. This report was the one to make Smith take some actions. However, the statement made by the report was denied by an executive at China Film Group, who said there was no ban and that Hollywood movies are still being reviewed by the company for release in the country.

But this action is not unprecedented in China. It is not the first time that foreign movies are banned from their theaters. Foreign films have been banned before  during holidays and school vacations, when the biggest audiences are registered, in order to help the Chinese studios make a comeback.

"I Am Legend," based on the Richard Matheson novel by the same name, is set in New York where Smith is one of the lone survivors of a deadly global epidemic. It has been adapted for the big screen on two previous occasions — first as "The Last Man on Earth" in 1964 and then as "The Omega Man" in 1971.