Film fans flee censors to get bigger picture

IT IS a story of love, lust and betrayal set in the brutal arena of China during the Second World War. So shocking are some of the scenes – to some eyes – that internationally-renowned director Ang Lee's latest film has had several of its most explicit scenes cut by the censors.

Increasingly affluent Chinese movie-goers are however no longer content to accept their government's views on morality. For weeks now, the ranks of Chinese visitors to Hong Kong have swelled with a brand-new category of film-loving tourists.

Mainland movie fans are flocking in their thousands to the former British colony to see the full, uncut version of the Taiwan-born director's Lust, Caution.

The phenomenon of so many people voting, as it were, with their feet has highlighted the public's rapidly changing attitudes toward the long unquestioned practice of government censorship of the arts, and prompted debate about the way films are regulated in China.

Travellers have made their way to Hong Kong to see movies before, of course, but always in much smaller numbers. Critics and commentators attribute the interest in Lee's movie to a variety of factors, from word of mouth about risqu sexual content stripped from the censored version, to a sensitive political subtext rarely seen in mainland cinema, to the fame of the Academy Award-winning director.

Perhaps most important, however, is the rise of a class of affluent urbanites in China's rich eastern cities who have grown increasingly accustomed to ever more choice in their lives.

"I went to Hong Kong with my girlfriend to see Lust, Caution because it was heavily censored here," said Liang Baijian, 25, a businessman and stock market investor from the Guangxi region. "We could have bought a pirated copy of the movie here, but we were not happy with the control and wanted to support the legal edition of the film."

At least one Chinese movie fan has tried to sue the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, which regulates the industry, for deleting some of the film's content. The director, Lee, has said the censored material was regarded as politically unacceptable in Beijing because it reinforced the notion of sympathy between a young Chinese woman and a collaborator with the Japanese occupiers.

Many in the Chinese film industry support the idea of introducing a ratings system like those used in Britain and the United States, which advocates say would lessen the need for outright censorship. The state film administration, however, has so far resisted.

Other travellers to Hong Kong, meanwhile, said they accepted the rationale of a censorship system in a country of stark disparities in regional income and education, but thought the practice was no longer justified in the cities.

Yan Jiawei, a graphic designer from Shanghai who saw Lust, Caution on a recent business trip to Hong Kong, said: "For myself, I strongly object to censorship, but for the country as a whole, I think I can still understand its necessity. It has something to do with people's educational level. In big cities like Shanghai, people will treat the deleted scenes as art, while those in less developed areas will only think of them as immoral."

Many within the movie industry said the fact that a censored Lust, Caution was available at all in mainland China demonstrated how far the parameters of the acceptable have broadened since the beginning of China's reform era more than two decades ago. Not long ago, Chinese film was thoroughly dominated by plot lines that heavy-handedly reinforced conventional dividing lines between good and bad, with little room for moral complexities. Unquestioned love of country was a favourite theme.

While many have been drawn to Lust, Caution by the allure of sex scenes so athletic that one government agency warned cinemagoers could threaten their health and safety if copied, even more groundbreaking for a film released here is the notion of a traitor in a leading role depicted as an attractive character instead of a villain.

"The country has undoubtedly become more and more open and advanced, and this is the tide of history, which no one can prevent," said Fang Li, a leading producer. "Compared to a market economy that's developing so fast, I've never seen an industry in China as backward as the film industry."

Fang said much of the blame lay with the censors, a group of mostly elderly people who work in committee and invite critical comment on movies from different branches of government, from the Women's Federation to provincial councils, all seeking to present their constituency in the best light and to avoid offence. The censors "spend most of their time worrying how not to lose their post," he said. "They are very careful not to make mistakes."

Other critics of the system believe the country's censors have also become much more careful about leaving their fingerprints on a decision. Wu Di, a researcher at the China Movie Art Centre in Beijing, said when the director Tian Zhuangzhuang shot The Blue Kite, a 1993 movie about the banned topic of the Cultural Revolution, notice was sent throughout the film industry warning companies against hiring him in the future. Tian framed one of the notices and hung it on his wall, referring to it in interviews with journalists.

"Now, under the so-called harmonious society, they wouldn't do things so baldly," said Wu. Instead of publishing a banning notice, nowadays the same result is achieved with a few phone calls, which leave little trace.

Li Yu, director of a recent film Lost In Beijing, which has some nudity, said she tried hard to remain positive, even after having being forced to excise several minutes from her movie.

"People who make movies in China understand the situation well, and a lot of them are criticising the system, saying that censorship prevents them from making good movies, which is partly true," Li said. "But I feel the environment is becoming more and more relaxed."

Protecting the People's Republic

The Chinese government does not apply a blanket ban to Hollywood films but ensures they are seen by as few of its citizens as possible. The Pursuit Of Happyness, the new movie starring Will Smith, right, will be screened next month, but only in digital format, meaning its release will be restricted to around 300 cinemas.

By comparison, the distributor for the new Chinese epic The Warlords issued more than 1,000 copies of the film.

The government also imposes quotas on foreign films, allowing only 20 to be screened every year.

Another avenue of censorship is believed to be the deliberate implantation by government agents of viruses on websites that provide online video or download services of films.

The internet is a favoured target of censorship. Specialists estimate there are more than 30,000 censors employed to monitor the world wide web alone. They are equipped with advanced technology to block sensitive sites and sound the alarm when words deemed politically incorrect show up on the screen.

The censorship extends to dissent. Earlier this year the Beijing authorities barred the ownership of any dog over 14 inches high and restricted each family to only one animal.

When retired commerce ministry official Chen Yuhua, who owns a 2ft dog, contested the new rules on the internet, saying they were unreasonable and were being enforced arbitrarily, his posting was banned by the official censors.

Chen is fighting the ban through the Chinese courts, although success is highly unlikely.