Yingying, Zhenzhen and Fenfen? China at the Festivals

Dina Iordanova30 May 2013

Diversify the picture

Soviet masterpieces emerging at the festivals

See their films!

Bullish on the Chinese: Jim Rogers, the ‘investment biker’

‘Firing back’ at Cannes?

I cannot accept that when it comes to Chinese films, the West seems for a long time to have had just the one 'political' reading: if it's not "against the government" then it's "for the government". The naïveté and lack of perspective [lit. "one-sidedness"] of using so simple a concept to judge a film is obvious. With respect to the works of directors from America, France and Italy for example, I doubt you have the same point of view.

Zhang Yimou’s letter to Cannes IFF, 1999

Two types of film festivals

The CORRECTIVE festival

No industry or city interests represented

Activist, often preaching to the converted

Public, filmmakers (often clandestine)

Specialist media/soft news.

The BUSINESS CARD EXCHANGE festival

Political and industry interests.

‘Power, prestige, and glamour’.

Executives in ‘foreplay’.

Messages tailored for the mainstream media.

The CORRECIVE film festival

No industry or city interests represented

Activist, often preaching to the converted

Public, filmmakers (often clandestine)

Specialist media/ soft news.

In search of ‘truer representation’

‘In the end, the exhibition at the Palais offers up the kind of cinema that the authorities would like to see proliferate.  […] China’s National Language Day might have been better served by showing a truer representation of the culture that China’s independent citizens are now producing about life as they are actually living it.  In short, the kind of films that cultural renegades and outliers like Ai Weiwei and Wu Wenguang favor.  In a perfect world, Ai Weiwei and Wu Wenguang would almost certainly be more convincing ambassadors for the true force of China’s contemporary culture than what we see on offer here.  But we don't live in a perfect world. Instead, we find ourselves caught up in a world that is still a work in progress.’

William Dowell, ‘Chinese Film Festival at the Palais des Nations,’ The Essential Geneva, April 2013.

Zhan 展 v. Jie 节

De Pékin à Taipei, 1000 visages de la Chine,

Forum des Images, Paris, 9 January – 3 March 2013

The BUSINESS CARD EXCHANGE festival

Political and industry interests.

‘Power, prestige, and glamour’.

Executives in ‘foreplay’.

Messages tailored for the mainstream media.

China Image FF Shanghai IFF

‘Playing to the World’s Biggest Audience’

China Film Biz: Optimisic View

China Film Biz: Revised Conservative Estimate

‘I am against censorship, but this is an important market’

FENG Xiaogang, April 2013 2013

The dogs are barking, yet the caravan goes on

Hollywood ‘collaborates’ with the censors

ZHANG Yuan, December 2012

Why did I ever agree to give this talk?