August 17th, 2009
This Post is Not Yet Harmonized
I’d be a liar if I say that my news blog here is as balanced as the news should be. Gathering the news is only one of the reasons why I started this blog, another reason being for me to share my opinion on the news I choose to share.
Yes, I don’t choose to report all the news I see, because some I don’t know well enough to cover, and some I just don’t care. For example, Johnnie To getting a retrospective at Pusan would be relevant for the blog. “Leng Mo” Chrssie Chau going out with her boyfriend or whether TVB star Kevin Cheng will be friends with his Flaming Hearts (trust me, it’s about firefighters) co-stars would not.
So accusing this blog of bias would not be a criticism, but a statement of fact. You can’t fight fact because it’s true.
Fact: Chinese censorship exists.
Fact: Hong Kong filmmakers self-censor or censor each other in order to fit their films for the Chinese market.
Case in point: Alan Mak and Felix Chong said, as quoted in Hong Kong Film Magazine (the new version of City Entertainment), that Overheard was only made after several of their ideas were rejected for not being able to pass Chinese censors. The only reason producer Derek Yee got Overheard made was because corruption is a popular genre in China. So popular that I’ve seen a whole shelf of TV drama DVDs in a Shenzhen legit DVD store under the genre label “Corruption”.
Fact: The Mainland Chinese version of Overheard has several extra scenes that show one character is clearly working with the ICAC. The Hong Kong version keeps the gray-ish morality and ends that way.
Fact: The directors of Lady Cop and Papa Crook had to edit their film three times, as well as do additional reshoots, with the Chinese censorship body finally accepting the fourth version. Even the final Mainland version is reported to have been further “harmonized” from the Hong Kong theatrical version.
Fact: Transformers 2 was “harmonized”
Fact: Lost in Beijing was “harmonized”, then was banned anyway.
Fact: Lust, Caution was “harminized” voluntarily, then was banned, along with its female star, who has now since immigrated to Hong Kong and finally found a follow-up role.
So can anyone really blame me for not being a fan of China’s State Administration of Film and Television? I guarantee you won’t be after you realize its ex-deputy director went off to make this movie:
Compared to this, Rush Hour 3 is an artistic achievement.
With films like that driving China’s domestic film market (so bad that 74% of the 2450 voters on Chinese entertainment rating site Douban gave it a failing grade) and Transformers 2 becoming the most popular movie EVER there, I’d think an argument that a good co-production film is made in spite of China is a fair one.
Another “in spite of” argument? On Her Majesty Secret Service is lazy and unfunny, in spite being made for a Mainland Chinese audience.
Oh, I’m sorry, that’s a “because of” argument.
August 18th, 2009 at 11:41 am
i absolutely hate CSAFT and their pro-government agenda. its one of the worst things to happen to chinese cinema. CSAFT has destroyed artistic creativity in movies, especially hong kong films.
funny story for ya. i was bored and decided to go to the CSAFT site and post on their comments section. i was writing something that was bad mouthing CSAFT and it wouldn’t let me post it. it wouldn’t even let me submit for moderator review. at firtst, i thought maybe because it was in english so i translated it on google and it still wouldn’t let me do it. it said something on the site but i didn’t know what it said.
oh, btw, what is that looking for jackie movie? i’ve never heard of it and i saw it in my local asian dvd bootleg store
August 19th, 2009 at 3:33 am
well no one is fan of censorship but hey they’re commies it’s their ways of life for so long, but now it’s more like saving face if you know what i meant!!! if you have to accept one choice what choice do you prefer? banned or cut
BTW you have presented all the facts but I have not detected any of your though of the subject, just hints but hints could lean both ways. Did Mr. K censor you !!!
August 19th, 2009 at 11:20 am
Hi, Langong,
This post just reinforces the reason for the bias I have when I report China-related film news.
My simple, not-so-eloquent thought on the subject: the SARFT sucks, and they’re destroying the art of film, both Chinese and foreign when they should leave that to producers, directors, and writers.