France in the Mood for Chinese Cinema
November 21, 2000 - 0:0
PARIS Chinese-language films have struck a chord as never before with French audiences, with three films clocking up nearly two million ticket sales in the past six weeks.
According to an AFP report, since its release last month, Ang Lee's "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" has attracted nearly 1,500,000 filmgoers, an unprecedented achievement for a Chinese film and one which places it ahead of standard Hollywood fare such as "The Perfect Storm" or "The Patriot".
Wong Kar-Wai's sumptuous "In the Mood for Love" meanwhile has sold 163,000 tickets in its first week, with industry experts anticipating a total of 600,000, and Edward Yang's three-hour "Yi Yi" (a one and a two) is heading for 250,000 spectators in the month since its release.
All three films were highly praised at last May's Cannes Film Festival, Yang taking the Best Director Award and Wong Kar-Wai's film winning the Best Actor Award for its star, Tony Leung Chiu-Wai, and the Technical Award.
"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" was screened out of competition but was widely seen as the hit of the festival, winning a standing ovation from public and critics alike.
Still to come is another of the Cannes Festival's Chinese-language contingent, Jiang Wen's Grand Prix-winning "Guizi Lai Le" (Devils on the Doorstep).
Other films expected shortly include Jia Zhangke's "Platform", screened at Venice last September, Zhang Yang's "Shower", Lou Ye's "Suzhou River" and Chen Kaige's "The Emperor and the Assassin".
To meet the growing demand -- a 7.8 percent market share on opening day rose to 11.3 percent by week's end -- ocean films added a further seven copies for the second week.
The French taste for Chinese-language cinema has developed slowly but surely over the past decade.
As the specialist magazine Positif noted in its latest issue, the days when a Venice Festival-winning films such as Hsiao Hou-Hsien's 1990 "City of Sadness" could be ignored by French distributors are long gone.
The major figures in China's fifth generation of filmmakers, Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige, are well-known to French filmgoers.
The diversity of styles and themes adopted by the three films currently taking the French box-office by storm, set variously in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, leads Positif, to observe that there may be "two Chinas, but (they form) three systems, and three ways of making films."
According to an AFP report, since its release last month, Ang Lee's "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" has attracted nearly 1,500,000 filmgoers, an unprecedented achievement for a Chinese film and one which places it ahead of standard Hollywood fare such as "The Perfect Storm" or "The Patriot".
Wong Kar-Wai's sumptuous "In the Mood for Love" meanwhile has sold 163,000 tickets in its first week, with industry experts anticipating a total of 600,000, and Edward Yang's three-hour "Yi Yi" (a one and a two) is heading for 250,000 spectators in the month since its release.
All three films were highly praised at last May's Cannes Film Festival, Yang taking the Best Director Award and Wong Kar-Wai's film winning the Best Actor Award for its star, Tony Leung Chiu-Wai, and the Technical Award.
"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" was screened out of competition but was widely seen as the hit of the festival, winning a standing ovation from public and critics alike.
Still to come is another of the Cannes Festival's Chinese-language contingent, Jiang Wen's Grand Prix-winning "Guizi Lai Le" (Devils on the Doorstep).
Other films expected shortly include Jia Zhangke's "Platform", screened at Venice last September, Zhang Yang's "Shower", Lou Ye's "Suzhou River" and Chen Kaige's "The Emperor and the Assassin".
To meet the growing demand -- a 7.8 percent market share on opening day rose to 11.3 percent by week's end -- ocean films added a further seven copies for the second week.
The French taste for Chinese-language cinema has developed slowly but surely over the past decade.
As the specialist magazine Positif noted in its latest issue, the days when a Venice Festival-winning films such as Hsiao Hou-Hsien's 1990 "City of Sadness" could be ignored by French distributors are long gone.
The major figures in China's fifth generation of filmmakers, Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige, are well-known to French filmgoers.
The diversity of styles and themes adopted by the three films currently taking the French box-office by storm, set variously in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, leads Positif, to observe that there may be "two Chinas, but (they form) three systems, and three ways of making films."