{ "id": "epha1c02kd", "slug": "tiny-times-3", "title": "Tiny Times 3", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": 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"https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.franchise-series" } ] } ], "excerpt": "Tiny Times 3 (小时代3：刺金时代), also released as Tiny Times 3.0, is a 2014 Chinese romantic drama film directed by Guo Jingming and the third installment of the Tiny Times franchise.", "snippet": "Tiny Times 3 (小时代3：刺金时代), also released as Tiny Times 3.0, is a 2014 Chinese romantic drama film directed by Guo Jingming and the third installment of the Tiny Times franchise.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.franchise-series.franchise-series.teen-comedy-series-entries.entries-released-in-the-2010s", "markdown": "# Tiny Times 3\n\n**Tiny Times 3** (小时代3：刺金时代, also released as *Tiny Times 3.0*) is a 2014 Chinese romantic drama film, the third installment of the [Tiny Times](https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times) franchise, directed and written by Guo Jingming (郭敬明) and adapted from the first half of his 2011 novel *Tiny Times 3.0* (小时代3.0 刺金时代).[1](https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/270842-3) • [2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) It follows four Shanghai friends, Lin Xiao, Gu Li, Nan Xiang, and Tang Wanru, as they leave university for the workplace and face challenges of friendship, love, and career.[1](https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/270842-3) Released in China on July 17, 2014, it set a first-day record for a domestic 2D film and briefly topped the Chinese box office ahead of *Transformers: Age of Extinction*.[3](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl25068801/) • [4](https://baike.sogou.com/m/v66153010.htm) • [5](https://www.screendaily.com/tiny-times-3-tops-china-box-office/5075475.article)\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Original title | 小时代3：刺金时代 (*Xiao shi dai 3: Ci jin shi dai*)[1](https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/270842-3) |\n| Director and writer | Guo Jingming, adapting his own 2011 novel[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) |\n| Release | July 17, 2014, China; running time 126 minutes[3](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl25068801/) • [6](https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Xiao-shi-dai-3-%282014-China%29) |\n| Opening weekend | $50.12 million over four days (July 17–20), 9.8 million admissions, No. 1 in China[5](https://www.screendaily.com/tiny-times-3-tops-china-box-office/5075475.article) |\n| First-day record | 1.1亿 yuan opening day, the first 2D film in mainland Chinese history to pass 100 million yuan on its first day[4](https://baike.sogou.com/m/v66153010.htm) |\n| Total gross | $82,320,000 worldwide per Box Office Mojo; The Numbers lists $75,490,000[3](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl25068801/) • [6](https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Xiao-shi-dai-3-%282014-China%29) |\n| Lead cast | Yang Mi (Lin Xiao), Amber Kuo (Gu Li), Bea Hayden Kuo (Nan Xiang), Xie Yilin (Tang Wanru), Kai Ko (Gu Yuan)[1](https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/270842-3) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Plot\n\nThe four friends, close since high school, are reunited under one roof: Gu Li, chief financial officer at the fashion magazine ME, pays for a splashy apartment in Sinan Mansions, and Lin Xiao heads off Nan Xiang at the train station.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) ME's editor-in-chief Gong Ming invites his assistant Lin Xiao, along with Nan Xiang and Tang Wanru, to a fashion show in Rome, which supplies the film's extended pre-title sequence.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/)\n\nThe plot then darkens. Lin Xiao learns that Zhou Chongguang, Gong Ming's younger step-brother and her boyfriend, has died of cancer in the United States, and she takes almost a year to recover.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) Nan Xiang discovers her mother has accrued gambling debts; Gu Li's younger brother Gu Zhun reveals that he inherited a missing 20 percent of their late father's company, Shenggu, and that ME is ripe for takeover; and Gu Yuan's mother, Ye Chuanping, now head of Shenggu, tells Gong Ming to dismiss Gu Li.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) To establish the true state of ME's finances, Gu Li enlists her three friends to break into Gong Ming's study during the magazine's eighth-anniversary party and photograph documents, a plan of which Gong Ming is tipped off.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) Chen Xuedong plays both Zhou Chongguang and, after his death, the lookalike Chinese-American model Lu Shao (Shaun), who reminds Lin Xiao of the late Zhou.[1](https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/270842-3) • [2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/)\n\n## Production\n\nGuo Jingming adapted the first half of his 2011 novel *Tiny Times 3.0*, the third book in his best-selling series.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) Like the first two films, it was shot back to back with the fourth and final installment, from December 2013 to March 2014; the fourth film was planned for [Chinese New Year](https://www.edgepedia.org/chinese-new-year) 2015 but was delayed until July 2015.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/)\n\n**Casting change.** Vivian Dawson (Jin Rong), a Canadian-born, New Zealand-raised, half-Chinese Singaporean actor-model, took over the role of the emotionless editor Gong Ming from half-Welsh Taiwan actor Rhydian Vaughan, who played it in the first two films.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) • [7](https://www.jaynestars.com/movies/tiny-times-3-0-opens-july-17-in-china/) New faces included the quarter-American Korean boybander-model [Lee Hyun](https://www.edgepedia.org/lee-hyun)-jae (Yi Hyeon-jae) as Gu Li's cousin Neil.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/) Returning behind the camera were Taiwan-Canadian cinematographer Che Liangyi (Randy Che) and production designer Huang Wei (Rosalie Huang), with South Korean artists handling art direction and set design.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/)\n\n## Box office\n\nThe film opened in China on July 17, 2014, and grossed 1.1亿 yuan (about $17.8 million) on its first day, including 6.85 million yuan from midnight screenings, becoming the first 2D film in mainland Chinese history to pass 100 million yuan on its opening day and setting a single-day record for a domestic 2D film.[4](https://baike.sogou.com/m/v66153010.htm) Over the four-day weekend of July 17–20 it took $50.12 million from 9.8 million admissions, unseating *Transformers: Age of Extinction* from the top of the Chinese chart; *Transformers 4* still added $26.08 million in its fourth week toward a cumulative $306.28 million.[5](https://www.screendaily.com/tiny-times-3-tops-china-box-office/5075475.article) The Los Angeles Times reported a $51.8 million week and noted that with this release the franchise had cleared the 1-billion renminbi mark (about $161 million), the most of any Chinese film franchise at that time according to Artisan Gateway.[8](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/cotown/la-et-ct-china-box-office-transformers-tiny-times-story.html)\n\nWeekly grosses fell steeply: $50.12 million in the first week, $24.73 million in the second (down 50.7 percent), and $6.62 million in the third (down 73.2 percent), toward a China total of $82,320,000.[3](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl25068801/) Chinese sources put the cumulative mainland total at 5.2亿元 as of July 10, 2015.[4](https://baike.sogou.com/m/v66153010.htm) The Numbers lists a lower worldwide figure of $75,490,000, a discrepancy between databases that remains unresolved.[6](https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Xiao-shi-dai-3-%282014-China%29) A 2016 academic paper states that Tiny Times 3 generated the greatest revenue of the four-film series, citing a figure of 5.22 billion RMB, an order of magnitude above the 5.2亿元 reported in Chinese sources.[9](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2059436417695279)\n\n## Reception\n\nCritical response was negative. On Metacritic the film had two reviews, both negative: Variety's Maggie Lee scored it 30, writing that the film's vacuous characters and inherent vanity had become awfully grating, and [The Hollywood Reporter](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-hollywood-reporter)'s Clarence Tsui scored it 20, calling the narrative laughable and the storytelling scatterbrained.[10](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/tiny-times-30/) The film received two Huading Award nominations and one Chinese Film Media Awards nomination.[10](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/tiny-times-30/)\n\n**Audience profile.** The film's takings skewed young: audiences aged below 19 accounted for 41 percent of its box office and those aged 20 to 29 for 28 percent, according to figures cited by Beijing Review from the state film administration.[11](https://www.bjreview.com.cn/pdf/2015/05.pdf) The book *China's Mobile Economy* describes the film's origination, production, and distribution as shaped by social media, big data, and internet financing: the producer drew on the novel's online fans for suggestions on selecting the director and stars, and distributors claimed that not a single advertising billboard was used nationwide, with promotion run through the social networks of high school students and young adults.[12](https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/chinas-mobile-economy/9781119127239/c07.xhtml)\n\n## Context in the series\n\nThe Tiny Times films adapt Guo Jingming's novel trilogy about four young women in contemporary Shanghai and have been widely discussed as a leading example of the Chinese \"fan movie\" (粉丝电影), a film targeting fans of a specific literary work or celebrity.[9](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2059436417695279) The series was denounced by cultural and media critics for distorting the values of the young generation while its box office returns, over 1.67 billion RMB for the whole series, made Guo Jingming an important player in the Chinese film industry.[13](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/314668116_Guo_Jingming_and_His_Tiny_Times_Film_Series) Reviewer Derek Elley, writing on Sino-Cinema, placed Guo's make-believe Shanghai, with its fashion-plate women, colonial architecture, and annual snowfall, in the lineage of commercial Shanghai films of the 1930s and late 1940s, and rated the film 6 out of 10, noting that it does not find its feet until an hour in, during a setpiece of the foursome on a Mission: Impossible-like operation.[2](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/)\n\n## References\n\n1. [Tiny Times 3 (2014), The Movie Database](https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/270842-3)\n2. [Derek Elley, Review: Tiny Times III (2014), Sino-Cinema](https://sino-cinema.com/2015/12/17/review-tiny-times-iii/)\n3. [Tiny Times 3.0, Box Office Mojo](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl25068801/)\n4. [小时代3：刺金时代, 搜狗百科](https://baike.sogou.com/m/v66153010.htm)\n5. [Liz Shackleton, Tiny Times 3 tops China box office, Screen Daily (2014)](https://www.screendaily.com/tiny-times-3-tops-china-box-office/5075475.article)\n6. [Xiao shi dai 3 (2014), The Numbers](https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Xiao-shi-dai-3-%282014-China%29)\n7. [Tiny Times 3.0 Opens July 17 in China, JayneStars (2014)](https://www.jaynestars.com/movies/tiny-times-3-0-opens-july-17-in-china/)\n8. [Julie Makinen, Chinese chick-flick dethrones Transformers from atop mainland box office, Los Angeles Times (2014)](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/cotown/la-et-ct-china-box-office-transformers-tiny-times-story.html)\n9. [Yilu Liang and Wanqi Shen, Fan economy in the Chinese media and entertainment industry, Global Media and China (2016)](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2059436417695279)\n10. [Tiny Times 3.0 Reviews, Metacritic](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/tiny-times-30/)\n11. [Top 10 Box Office Movies in China 2014, Beijing Review (2015)](https://www.bjreview.com.cn/pdf/2015/05.pdf)\n12. [Winston Ma, China's Mobile Economy, Chapter 7: Internet+ Movies, Wiley](https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/chinas-mobile-economy/9781119127239/c07.xhtml)\n13. [Shenshen Cai, Guo Jingming and His Tiny Times Film Series (2017)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/314668116_Guo_Jingming_and_His_Tiny_Times_Film_Series)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Franchise and series entries as standalone works › Teen and comedy series film entries › Entries released in the 2010s*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times-3", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times-3.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"Tiny Times 3\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times-3. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[Tiny Times 3](https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times-3)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times-3](https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times-3). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"Tiny Times 3\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/tiny-times-3. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "Tiny Times 3, also released as Tiny Times 3.0, is a 2014 Chinese romantic drama film directed by Guo Jingming and the third installment of the Tiny Times franchise." }