To bid, or not to bid: the Oscar race in China

Poster of Hero [Photo/Mtime]

At that time, literary films seemed to win the favor of western film festival juries and occupy a huge market share in the Chinese mainland. Indeed, the twenty years from 1985 to 2005 represent the golden period for Chinese literary films and make the world better understand Chinese film as an art form.

However, a vicious circle began to make inroads on the film industry in China.

Quite a few directors paid too much attention to producing literary films, despite public response and box office failure. And in many research centers and institutions of higher learning, teachers have advocated the French New Wave while looking down on commercial films.

“At that time, young people would rather watch Hong Kong comedies and costume films through renting VCDs at home than support ongoing art films at the theaters,” says Wang Yichuan, director of the School of Arts at Peking University.

“The film industry in the Chinese mainland was out of line with the general public at that time. Movies should play the role of enriching people’s daily lives before acting as a tool to win film awards,” says Wang.