HONG KONG (AFP) - A poster for the upcoming Hollywood movie Arrival that mistakenly features a Shanghai landmark on Hong Kong's skyline was taken down from the film's official Facebook page on Friday (Aug 19) after sparking outrage and ridicule.

The error sparked a torrent of comments on social media under the hashtags #HongKongisnotChina and #HongKongindependence.

Others called for a boycott of the film, due for release in November.

The poster showed a giant vertical spaceship over the semi-autonomous city's harbour with the Oriental Pearl Tower, perhaps Shanghai's best known landmark, prominently featured in the foreground.

"Please remove this ugly tower from Victoria Harbour," Facebook user Chin Chiu Man commented, while another angry user said: "Why don't you put a pyramid in New York".

The poster was still displayed on the official Facebook page on Thursday evening but was replaced by a message on Friday blaming a contractor for the gaffe.

"An error in one in a series of posters for Arrival was made by a third party vendor," the message read.

"We are disappointed to have not caught the error."

Hong Kong was returned to China by its former colonial ruler Britain in 1997 under the agreement that its freedoms would be guaranteed for 50 years.

But there are growing concerns that Beijing is no longer adhering to the deal and critics accuse it of interference in a wide range of areas, from politics to the media and education.

Arrival stars Amy Adams, Forest Whitaker and Jeremy Renner and is directed by Canada's Denis Villeneuve. It opens in the United States and other major markets in November.

The Oriental Pearl Tower and the Hong Kong skyline are not thought to have featured in any of the film's trailers so far released.