|
Home>News Center>China | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
Film focuses on back-stage action
The recent Chinese film "Life Translated" has caused an uproar but not because of its content - in this case, it's because of its close connection to power.
It has been widely reported that primary and middle school students in the city were actually told to buy tickets to see the film in October. The instruction was made in an official notice issued by five departments of the Shenzhen municipal government. Once it was reported in the media, the public began to question the justness of the move. Under mounting pressure, Li Yizhen made a public apology earlier this month. Claiming he had nothing to do with the notice, Li admitted that he has vialated Party rules forbidding government and Party leaders' families from doing business in districts where they serve. The rules were designed to prevent corruption resulting in officials abusing power. "My heart is heavy and I have submitted a thorough self-examination to the city Party committee," Li's apology, which was published by China Youth Daily early this month, said. "I have already asked my family members to pull commercial operations out of the fields that I am in charge of." Li is now in charge of ideological areas including education, publicity, culture and arts in Shenzhen. His wife, Lai Xinping, is the general manager of the Shenzhen Renhe Overseas Investment Company, which mainly operates an overseas education agent service. Niuniu is the general manager of the Shenzhen Dream Tunnel Movie, which sponsored the film, and the TV Culture Company, and on the board of the Shenzhen Pike Electronic Company, according to business registration records from the local industry and commerce bureau. Responding to media calls, the Shenzhen Party committee launched an investigation into the story behind the movie. The investigation team announced on Thursday that Li had "failed to make sure related departments stop issuing recommendation notices about the movie starring his daughter." "The investigation team urged Li to persuade his wife and daughter to withdraw totally from the three companies they operated or invested in as soon as possible," the article, published on the Shenzhen Government's website, said. Media play bigger role Li's apology marked a rare admission by a Party official of wrongdoing, and one which was mainly provoked by media interest. In late October, some popular websites, including cat898.com and ebobo.net, made public a letter from the parent of a junior middle school student in Shenzhen. It complained that Shenzhen schools were ordering their students to pay 20 yuan (US$2.4) for tickets to the film, which is based on Niuniu's memoirs of her study at an exclusive British boarding school. The schools showed parents a notice jointly issued by several government departments and the city's Communist Youth League branch. "This is a good movie reflecting the upbringing of modern young people," said the notice. The parent's letter provoked a torrent of criticism on local Internet bulletin boards. Phoenix TV reported the case on October 29 and quoted officials with the Shenzhen Culture Bureau, one of the departments that had issued the notice, as saying they had simply recommended the movie as a good choice for local schools but were not forcing students to see it. The media were still not satisfied. Niuniu arrived in Britain aged 16 and later went to Denver University in the United States and New York's Columbia University. Her memoirs of her schooling abroad were published in 2002 in a book called "Sheep with Wings," which was later made into the film. "Sheep with Wings" was an instant hit, being reprinted 10 times with 125,000 copies sold. The book has won a number of awards, including the National Advanced Best-sellers, Guangdong New Talents and New Creations Award, the National Women's Literature Award and Shenzhen Youth Literature Award. Then came the screenplay. Co-starring Hong Kong heart-throb Edison Chen (Chen Guanxi), the film was released nationwide late last month. Despite Chen's star appeal and a massive publicity campaign, it opened to unfavourable reviews and a meagre box office, failing to come close to recouping its costs, according to the China Movie News weekly. It was shot in Britain on a budget of 21 million yuan (US$2.5 million) and said to be the most expensive movie of the youth genre in the country. In the first three days of its nationwide debut, the film collected 670,000 yuan (US$81,000) in ticket sales across the country, the weekly newspaper said. Among them, more than 600,000 yuan (US$72,000) were bought in Shenzhen alone. The Beijing Youth Daily also said on November 4 that Niuniu is the major shareholder of three companies in Shenzhen and controls total funds of 7.69 million yuan (US$926,500). Queries were now raised over how the 25-year-old student got hold of these funds and how she managed to sustain her nine years' schooling overseas. Annual costs for schooling and living in the United Kingdom are about 200,000-300,000 yuan (US$24,000-35,000). Yet the annual per capita average income of Guangdong urban residents was just 20,000 yuan (US$2,400) last year, official statistics show. Expensive foreign education, virtually unheard of until recent years, is in most cases available only to children of the elite. The media have played a big role in this case and in promoting further supervision of government officials, said Professor Xu Xianglin with the School of Government at Peking University. Girl with instant fame Niuniu, the author-turned-actress, won instant fame, thanks to this debut film of hers. Niuniu was one of China's first batch of junior students abroad. She left America with a bachelor's degree in business administration from Denver and a master's degree on economic strategy management from Columbia. In June this year, Niuniu transferred to New York University and is now studying for a master's degree in film production. She told local newspapers late last year that she was ready to devote herself to the movie business. She may have to work a little harder to convince audiences. Online bulletin boards have already slated the book as "shallow and hollow" and the movie as "crap." In fact it was Niuniu's father who suggested she write a book about her experiences. "He actually asked me to practise my Chinese writing because I had many written mistakes in my letters home," Niuniu said. She admitted she had no idea about writing screenplays until the film director showed her how, then cast her as heroine. "The investors have confidence in me," she said. Niuniu left China for the United States earlier this month. The Nanfang Metropolis News reported that she has defended the film and denied her father had any connection with it. |
|
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
