Shipwreck documentary debuts at film festival

With the premiere of Chinese-made documentary The Sinking of the Lisbon Maru, the 26th Shanghai International Film Festival officially began at the Shanghai International Film Center on Friday.

Running through June 23, the festival will see about 1,600 showings of 450 film titles in 47 cinemas around Shanghai, as well as in six cinemas in Nanjing and Suzhou of Jiangsu province, Hangzhou and Ningbo of Zhejiang province, and Hefei of Anhui province.

The Sinking of the Lisbon Maru was produced and directed by Fang Li, who spent the past eight years studying the shipwreck that occurred during World War II.

The Lisbon Maru was a Japanese freighter that carried more than 1,800 British prisoners of war from the Battle of Hong Kong in 1941. The ship was on a voyage to Japan in 1942 when it was torpedoed by a United States submarine.

It sunk about 2 kilometers off the Dongji Islands, Zhejiang, resulting in the deaths of more than 800 British soldiers. More than 300 soldiers were rescued by Chinese fishermen who were nearby.

Fang said that after successfully locating the sunken ship, he made a commitment to the families of surviving British soldiers and Chinese fishermen to tell their stories in a documentary.

"It was a disaster and carnage that happened at our doorstep, and a heroic feat done by the most ordinary Chinese people … of course, the story should be told by us Chinese," Fang told the media after the premiere.

The premiere was attended by some of the family members of the British soldiers who survived or lost their lives in the Lisbon Maru incident, as well as Tony Benham, a Hong Kong-based British historian whose book, The Sinking of the Lisbon Maru: Britain's Forgotten War Tragedy, provided a solid foundation for the film.

Jointly hosted by the China Media Group and the Shanghai government, under the direction of the China Film Administration, the 26th SIFF received more than 3,700 entries from 105 countries and regions. Fifty movies from 29 countries and regions were shortlisted to enter the Golden Goblet Awards' main competition, and a record 38 of them will have their global premiere at the festival.

According to Chen Guo, director of the Shanghai International Film and Television Festival Center, this indicates that "the international influence of the Golden Goblet Award is increasing day by day."

She particularly promoted the works of Chinese directors' at the festival, which reflected the "high quality development of China's movie industry".

The jury for the main competition, led by French director and writer Anh Hung Tran, met with the media on Friday, during which Tran said he was very much interested in China and looked forward to collaborating with Chinese actors.

The challenge, he said, was finding a fitting project to work in China, he said.

The festival's opening gala, which will feature a star-studded red carpet, will take place on Saturday evening at the Shanghai Grand Theatre.