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July 27, 2005
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress
The book and film, Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress (translated in Vietnamese as Balzac và cô thợ may người Hoa bé nhỏ) by writer and director Dai Sijie arrived in Vietnam last year. My colleagues and I were frankly suprised to see it on the bookshelves in Vietnam for its criticism of Chinese politics during the Cultural Revolution cannot be overlooked. The film has now apparently has made it to American theaters. The film review in addition to today's article on director Dai Sijie:
"Mr. Dai moved to France from China in 1984 to study Western art, then cinema. He has lived here ever since, though not as a political exile: he retains a Chinese passport and is free to travel home. Yet when he sought permission to shoot his first three Chinese-language films in China, he was rebuffed. They were eventually made, two of them in France and one in Vietnam. None did well.It was precisely here that Mr. Dai ran up against problems. Chinese authorities banned the book, and then, having allowed him to make the film in China, they also banned the movie. "It wasn't that I touched the Cultural Revolution," Mr. Dai said over lunch in this town west of Paris near studios where he is editing his new movie. "They did not accept that Western literature could change a Chinese girl. I explained that classical literature is a universal heritage, but to no avail.
His new film, "The Botanist's Girls," is also set in China, but he was refused permission to make it there because it is a love story between two young women. So he shot it in Vietnam, using Chinese actors. And if "Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress" is any gauge, it will be available in China only through pirated videos and DVD's."
Will Vietnam soon be a choice location for on-location shooting? There are many incentives including low labor costs and now even post-production can be done in Vietnam with new state-of-the-art studios in Ho Chi Minh City.
Some news about film production in Vietnam on Thanh Nien News:
Perseverance, knowledge needed for foreign film aid
Overseas Vietnamese brings home latest movie techniques
U.S. director encourages more Vietnamese indie films
Posted by rst at July 27, 2005 06:37 PM
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