Chinese cinema featured at Toronto Film Festival

Despite the North American entertainment industry being mired in Hollywood's ongoing strike, the 48th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) kicked off as scheduled with a strong lineup of movies during a 10-day celebration.

As one of TIFF's official selections, Chinese director Ning Hao's The Movie Emperor starring Andy Lau will premiere at the festival, which opened on Sept 7.

Lau is "perfectly, cheekily cast as a movie star seeking relevance via a film festival-baiting art-house role in Ning's sharp satire of movie industry pretension. Vulnerable and sensing the need for a new image, Lau is persuaded to take the starring role in a humble indie drama where the protagonist is a village pig farmer. Lau and the director — played by Ning himself — agree this foray into miserabilist cinema will be just what foreign film festivals crave," according to the TIFF.

TIFF will be honouring the Hong Kong artist Lau with a Special Tribute Award at the movie's World Premiere Gala presentation on Friday.

Lau is one of the most popular entertainers in Hong Kong cinema, with a career spanning more than four decades, with more than 160 film credits. Recognized as one of the industry's icon, Lau's achievements have showcased Hong Kong's cultural soft power, according to Cultural Minister Kevin Yeung Yun-hung.

Another TIFF selection produced by Chinese filmmakers is Xu Haofeng's martial arts film 100 Yards.

Written and directed in collaboration with Xu Junfeng, this latest martial saga is set in 1920s Tianjin, China. Upon the death of a well-respected martial arts master, two students become bitter rivals as they vie for ownership of his academy.

Further featuring slingshot gangs, secret scrolls, eccentric weapons, and a touch of whimsical romantic melodrama, 100 Yards is a "stylish martial arts caper, simultaneously stoic and playfully funny in its coolly composed yet thrillingly percussive execution", according to TIFF.

"With respect to the martial arts genre, writer, director and choreographer Xu Haofeng is in a class all his own. The fight in the film is both a dance and a conversation, each movement pregnant with philosophy and sly wit, and each bout more enthralling and illuminating than the last," TIFF wrote in a review.

Organized by the North American Cultural and Art Exchange Association (NACAEA) and supported by the China Film Co-Production Corporation, the fifth China Film Exhibition once again appears at the festival with a mix of old and new films, reflecting the strong momentum of China's film market development.

"The China Film Exhibition is committed to promoting outstanding domestic films to ‘go international'. Through deepening the mutual learning of Chinese and foreign film cultures and exchanges among filmmakers, while connecting high-quality resources and telling Chinese stories, it will further expand opportunities for collaboration between Chinese and foreign films," Lisa Lin, president of NACAEA told China Daily.

According to Lin, several Chinese films have been recommended to filmmakers from around the world through the exhibition, while those same filmmakers also established connections with the Chinese film industry.

This year's exhibition featured 35 films. Among the shortlists, the movies that have performed well at the Chinese box office, such as Creation of The Gods 1, The Wandering Earth, Meg 2: The Trench, The Battle at Lake Changjin, and The Battle at Lake Changjin 2 have attracted the interest of overseas counterparts at the film festival.

In addition, a variety genre of films such as Never Say Never, Hidden Blade, I Am What I Am, Lightning Up the Stars, Heart's Motive and Sister are featured at the exhibition.

As a major feature of the China Film Exhibition, films based on Chinese domestic culture continue to hold an important position. The documentary Return to the Red Flag Canal weaves the storyline from a different perspective between a Westerner and a Chinese, as well as from the older generation and the younger one.

The Lost Memory of the Loss Land is a documentary that depicts the endless love of the people of northern Shaanxi for the land. In Search of Lost Time is another documentary adapted from the true events of 3,000 orphans entering Inner Mongolia.

The Beijing International Film Festival also provided a list of Chinese short films to one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world.

"All these films will further deepen the exchanges between Chinese cinema and the global film industry," Lin said. "And we believe that movie is one of the best mediums connecting the world."

China's box office continued to heat up in the summer months as July closed with $1.2 billion, the second biggest month this year, according to the latest data provided by Artisan Gateway.

The box office totaled $4.98 billion year to date, up 69 percent year-on-year, with 81 percent of the market share represented by Chinese-language titles and 19 percent by imported titles.