Chinese cinema revisited on a boat trip down Beijing's Grand Canal

Added: 2026-05-13

[00:00:06][music] [music] Chinese cinema connecting China to the world moment that really broke out Chinese cinema to the world was in 1993 [music] when Chen Kaiga's film Farewell My Concubine won the palm door showed the world just the majesty looking out Look at that beautiful day.

[00:00:32]>> Yes, [music] I know. That's gorgeous.

[00:00:35]>> Holiday is usually is the biggest time for box office in China.

[00:00:41][music] >> Hello and welcome to World Insight with me Tenway. Today we are in the western part of Chinese capital Beijing. An ancient city that enjoys a history of 3,000 years.

[00:00:54]One of the characteristics of this part of city is [music] the river nearby that connects the Grand Canal with the most impressive Chinese [music] royal garden, the summer palace. Today I will be on a boat ride with a friend of [music] mine, Dickerson, who is both a witness and a player in China's contemporary movie scene. So it's going to be a journey [music] of fun and friendship, past and future.

[00:01:21]Oh, here she comes.

[00:01:27]>> [music] [music] >> Heat.

[00:01:44]Heat.

[00:01:48]>> [music] [music] [music] >> For decades, the story of Chinese cinema has been one of constant reinvention. As of May 4th [music] this year, China's annual box office has topped 13.5 billion yuan. The Mayday holiday alone brought in over 600 million. But to better understand just how far Chinese cinema has gone, let's [music] go back to the very beginning.

[00:02:28]In 1905 in Beijing, [music] the Fangtai Photo Studio filmed Ding Jan Mountain, a silent film shot with a handc cranked wooden camera. It is widely recognized as the first Chinese produced film made just 10 years after the birth [music] of cinema itself.

[00:02:46]Fast forward to the late 1980s and early 1990s. Chinese filmmakers stepped onto [music] the global stage. Jangimo's Red Sorghum won the Golden Bear in Berlin.

[00:02:57]Cheng Kaiigi's Farewell My Concubine took home the palm door in Cane cinema was an art film powerhouse.

[00:03:09][screaming] Then came a [music] turning point. In 2002, Hero was blockbuster milestone, heralding a new era of commercial film making. It catalyzed the industry.

[00:03:21]Cinema screens quickly expanded while audience numbers surged and a new generation of hits captured the public imagination. Wolf Warrior 2 and The Wandering Earth were released.

[00:03:34]Films that didn't just break records, but [music] defined an era. And now another shift is underway. Artificial intelligence is remolding the film making process. Everything from script writing to production, from post- editing to distribution. Cinema itself is being reinvented again.

[00:03:54]So, what better way to reflect on Chinese [music] cinema's journey than a boat ride along Beijing's historic Imperial Canal on a bright spring day.

[00:04:03]>> Wow, we are taking off. [laughter] Indeed. Beautiful river, isn't it?

[00:04:10]It is gorgeous and it it so brings me back to my early years in Beijing um where I went to school in a neighborhood not far from here in the late 80s >> and it's just a magical part of Beijing >> and this is part of the historic river and historic water because it's part of the Grand Canal. Yes.

[00:04:31]>> Connects Beijing to the Grand Canal and that is has been a symbol of connectivity in China.

[00:04:38]>> Amazing. It has and it's very appropriate for our topic today on Chinese cinema connecting China to the world indeed.

[00:04:45]>> And I have to say it has been such a privilege and an honor, the honor of my lifetime to be able to be on this journey with China and Chinese filmmakers as well as American studios and partners who have been part of this great story where there's still um so much to come. The break the breakout uh moment for Chinese cinema was in 1993 when Chen Kaiga's film Farewell My Concubine won the Palm Door at the K Film Festival and it was Oscar nominated and it was distributed in North America by Miramax Films at the time.

[00:05:28][music] And it really showed the world just the majesty and capability and sensitivity and beauty of Chinese [music] cinema.

[00:05:58]>> [music] >> So now we are going through a bridge.

[00:06:03]You can see the stone walls [music] are right outside.

[00:06:06]>> Yes. And the beautiful uh traditional [music] uh Chinese bridge style as well. It's gorgeous.

[00:06:14]>> Yes. And of course a lot of uh neighborhoods nearby, you know, just for the common folks. People go fishing even sometimes.

[00:06:22]>> And what a [music] lovely place. And this is one of the things that made me fell in love uh with Beijing is just the access accessibility to the uh ancient uh sites [music] and just that it was everywhere. It's part of the architecture of the city. Wow.

[00:06:37]>> So we are reaching a small pier on top of that that is the the one a temple that's been there for a few hundred years. Imagine, you know, how much inspiration these kind of surroundings and cultures in Beijing could provide to the filmmakers, including people like Changai Girl who grew up of course in Beijing.

[00:06:59]>> Of course. And and in addition to Beijing Film Studio, there was a big infrastructure of studios. Xian Film Studio and of course from Xian, you had the late filmmaker Hoping Jang Mo, the brilliant uh cinematographer and filmmaker Guangi. Uh the brilliant cinematographer Jiao Fe. I mean there is a lineage of film making in this country that spans of course Beijing is sort of central because you have the Beijing film academy and and which is sort of the breeding ground for some great filmmakers but you also central central drama academy Beijing film academy but you also have a network of major film studios in the country and so >> what happened also in the '9s which was really interesting and >> I was thrilled to be a part of it um when I was working for Warner Brothers is we we brought cinemas. We started working with Chinese different Chinese partners to build cinemas throughout China. And so that was the one of the ingredients that was missing in mainland China to some extent.

[00:08:01]>> And really China from the late '9s till about 2010 >> exploded in terms of screen growth. So audiences could see movies. So in the early in the early early 2000s in the early part of this century 80% of the market was in 10 major cities. Now that within 10 years that changed and it became much more nationalized. So you had big markets in the southwest and in um >> cities like Shian and that that weren't so significant in the past. But the the explosion in screen growth in China uh really really evolved the marketplace and that's when you saw the expansion of um imported cinemas you saw in addition to the early they're called the fifth generation filmmakers. So you had Chen Kaiga Jang Mo Tenuang Duang etc. You had a new generation of filmmakers which we really tapped into at Beijing Film Studio and I was at Warner Brothers. We had an 18 picture a year output deal which means we bought 18 movies a year to put for broadcast rights. you know how open-minded the story link telling can be. people are looking at the ordinary people, not just the emperors.

[00:09:18]>> Well, but rather, you know, >> if if if you look at Farewell My Concubine, the backdrop of the story and as you mentioned, the different interpretations of history, but the story is about friendship, you know, 30 plus years later that when people talk about Chinese cinema, they still talk about this masterpiece. Now you had other filmmakers emerging around this time.

[00:09:59]That's another very different genre.

[00:10:02]It's >> it's a different era. But these art house movie going on, but you also have >> They're art house movies, but they're epic movies. You could say that. You could say that if there were the screens that there were today, how would those movies have performed? But we don't have that benchmark. But these movies were, you know, such great movies that they made they the world noticed them. right? The world noticed them and then you had a whole group of filmmakers um you know come come into the fold.

[00:10:32]>> But you look at a later decade you will see uh more joint production and also more foreign films into the Chinese cinema.

[00:10:44]>> Yeah. So in the in in the '9s when the the revenue sharing imported film uh mechanism was put in place with an agreement between the China Film Bureau and the Motion Picture Association of America. There was a quota of 10 films a year and I remember sometimes carrying the prints from the airport to China film [laughter] for them to be screened and traveling with colleagues from China Film to places like Jung Joe with prints for movies to put into the cinema. It was actually >> movie was called Fugitive. I still remember that. I watched that movie.

[00:11:16]>> I remember taking a film with Arnold Schwarzenegger called The Eraser to Jung Joe with an executive from China film in in a in a metal box. I mean, it was [laughter] just it was something. Um, and then in the early 2000, it expanded, I want to say, to 12 and then 15. And then of course when President Xiinping visited the United States in February of 2012, he really opened the market up that there the the the quota opened up to 34 revenue sharing films and then there were of course flat sale movies which are smaller more independent productions which had a separate channel for coming into the China market. So between, you know, I'd say 1997 and 2012, you really saw the globalization of the China market. Now, and then that led to a number of Chinese companies co-inancing >> uh Hollywood productions. And in terms of co-productions, I go back to the early 90s when we um when I was at Miramax Films and we got very active in the acquisition and the release of Chinese cinema, Chinese movies in the United States. So we uh co-inanced a film uh called Hero by Jangi Mo.

[00:12:43]which as of today is the remains the second highest grossing foreign language film of all time with a box office of over $16 million in North America. We also did a a co-production uh with u Michelle Yo uh called The Touch which was a very you know a very successful film as well. And then we did a service co-production uh for a film called Kill Bill, which was the first time you saw a really full American crew merging with a Chinese crew because I put the top tier um department heads on the project. We had a real global crew at Beijing Film Studio. And the director, Quentyn Tarantino, when he came to China, he said, "De I love this place. We're making the movie here. make it happen.

[00:13:35]>> But this is the time so many things are changing.

[00:13:40]China is looking at its own identity in the movie industry worldwide. You have technologies going on uh transforming with AI and meanwhile you have international talents that are flowing in different part corners of the world.

[00:13:55]So how does that you know work with the current stage of Chinese cinema?

[00:14:01]Well, I think we're at a really interesting moment and and again and and it just it this um this doesn't happen overnight. So, what you have is >> interest emerging. Um you have games.

[00:14:16]So, so the industry as a whole, not just in China, in the in the rest of the world as well is becoming much more driven by IP. And so kids throughout the Asia-Pacific re region, they're playing the same games, they're reading the same light novels, they're reading the same web tunes, they're reading the same manga, and the and and they're all they're all buying labu. So the the the the creation of IP of this base of IP is what is feeding the creative industries.

[00:14:47]And you know, there are big literary platforms. uh there's viaen on 10 cents platform and then there's uh uh fans on the uh uh bite dance platform and so you also have a lot of user uh generated IP or content being the basis for new storytelling and so with that um for example uh two years ago you had the game a year and a half ago which became a global yes which be which became a global phenomenon >> and you have um you have other uh Chinese stories that are that are that that that kids are watching everywhere. And also, you know, I think there was a moment um in 2025 when Tik Tok was shut down in the US and all the US users went to Rednote >> and they went to RedNote and they said, "Hey, life is pretty good in China. I want to know more. I want to see more.

[00:15:50]And I think that was an example of a of a moment that was just just happened.

[00:15:56]>> Nobody nobody financed it. Nobody said do this. People just said, "Oh, we can't use Tik Tok. Let's try another Chinese app." And they started seeing China.

[00:16:08]They started seeing life in China. And I think you you're starting to really see China's influence in the world, whether that's Red Node, whether that's Deep Seek, whether that's Labou, whether that's being a climate change leader, whether that's, you know, Chinese electric cars, and people are saying we want more. So you're starting to see recently many more Chinese series on Netflix. And I think you're starting to see I'm hearing from filmmakers and I and I talk to filmmakers all day long.

[00:16:43]I'm seeing filmmakers, Chinese filmmakers because the market kind of exploded here for a while. So you had everybody really focused on China. They didn't care about the rest of the world.

[00:16:54]There was a period of time I would say from about 2011 12 to 2017 18 where again the Chinese market was growing so dramatically that filmmakers really just focused on their home market >> and in the past few years this next generation of filmmakers which I I find inspiring um is really focused on bringing their stories to the >> [music] [music] >> Chinese cinema connecting China to the world moment that really broke out Chinese cinema to the world was in 1993 [music] when Chen Kaiga's film Farewell My Concubine won the palm [music] door showed the world just the majesty Look at that. Look at that.

[00:17:54]>> Beautiful day.

[00:17:55]>> Yes, I know. That's gorgeous.

[00:17:58]>> Holiday is usually is the [music] biggest time for box office in China.

[00:18:06]>> How do you see this this, you know, budding scene in China, you know, especially about cartoons, particularly with the AI technology?

[00:18:16]>> The next decade is going to be defined by partnerships.

[00:18:20]And whether that's partnerships for between major platforms and studios for >> bringing content in and taking content out for IP certainly because I think that when I look at content I look at it in three buckets.

[00:18:37]>> I look at the storytelling mechanisms in three buckets. Local for local, >> local for regional and local for global.

[00:18:44]Now there are some big big IPs or traditional stories uh like uh Sanin Dway or no like characters that are that can be developed for >> global audiences and should be developed with global partners so that they they >> they're not so specific that the audience is left behind and so um character-driven.

[00:19:11]When you say partnership, that's really the key, isn't it?

[00:19:14]>> Partnership and whether that's AI partnership, that's content distribution partnerships, that's content production partnerships. And I think we're at a really interesting moment stepping back from film uh for a minute in the Sino US relationship where we're kind of at a breakthrough moment and hopefully the upcoming summit goes well and it encourages uh both sides to uh to forge ahead.

[00:19:40]Everybody's thinking about it. A lot of the young entrepreneurs, they're also very patient. They try to make sure they are choosing the right partners and they are not just money oriented in terms of making a buck. It's more about how can I continue the legacy of my IPs. How can I make it even bigger?

[00:20:00]>> And and I think different talents have different ambitions. I think that some talent and some some entrepreneurs are very much focused on the China market and they're making the movie >> or the content for the China market and they don't they're not really thinking about the rest of the world. And there are other creatives >> you you could call them entrepreneurs as well who are saying I want to talk to a global audience. I want to people know me outside of China. I want more people to know me. I want my stories and my way of storytelling which is fresh because one of the things that's happened with um US content and I I hate to say this but there's some audience franchise fatigue because audiences globally have gotten a little tired of franchises that go on and on and on and on and I don't want to get into names but I think you all know what we're what kinds of movies were talking about. Um, and studios kind of felt for a period of time that these were safe because they had fans. They had, you know, fandom is, you know, in when when decision makers are deciding whether to greenlight a project or to buy a project.

[00:21:16]>> Um, this becomes a factor >> and and AI is now transforming the whole picture, isn't it? TV AI is definitely um transforming the whole picture and I think it might be the savior of our industry and I'll tell you why because the cost of making films has gotten so high that a lot of companies and a lot of the studios have not been making the kind of money that they used to. And I believe that with AI tools and AI efficiencies on the business end on the in the within the development cycle by shortening production times probably by half um you can make a previs for a film and start your post viz while you're doing the previs I think that it could cut costs negative costs of films by as much as you know 50%. It'll also allow for different kinds of product because you can make a pro a film for the size of its audience much more efficiently than we've had the opportunity to do so in the past. So I think it's actually an exciting transformative moment.

[00:22:23][music] Our [music] boat is sailing smoothly. Yes, >> very nice, quiet water and a beautiful day in Beijing. But I have to say sometimes the bilateral relations between China, United States has not necessarily been settling smoothly to say the least. And yet what kind of role did DD do you think movies and cultural exchanges can really play uh in the next stage of relationship?

[00:23:07]>> Well, I think it's I think it's fundamental. That's one of the reasons I do it. You know, I love cinema. When people ask what you do, I I I want to say I'm a bridgeuer and what content and sports and stories, they remind us all that we are humans. That we we're human beings who experience joy, who experience sadness, who imagine what life is like on another planet, who um >> it allows us to share our imaginations.

[00:23:39]And I think that this is missionritical.

[00:23:42]I think that um it's going to play an a more and more important role over the next decade, over the next two years, five years. And I think again we're at a moment when I think a lot of the older business mechanisms are still in place.

[00:23:59]And I think it's time to break through.

[00:24:01]I think we need to break through in terms of how we do business, how we share our platforms, how um we need to embrace each other more. Nice tea.

[00:24:14]>> Lovely.

[00:24:17]>> It's jasmine tea, isn't it?

[00:24:19]>> Yes.

[00:24:19]>> Yeah.

[00:24:23]>> Nice.

[00:24:24]>> Delicious.

[00:24:25]>> So, you just imagine sitting here looking at Beijing, you know, thinking about the movies. What a journey.

[00:24:34]>> What a journey. And it reminds me of the last time I was on a boat heading to the summer palace was with Chen Kaiga and Mel Gibson in 1997.

[00:24:47]>> Wow. You got all these big names >> when Mel Gibson was coming to visit uh the set of Chen Kaiga's film Jingo Suching Wong.

[00:24:54]>> Wow.

[00:24:55]>> And it was a real moment. I mean, because of course, Mel Gibson was at the pinnacle of his career, having just made Braveheart, [music] and it was just so much fun and so much possibility. Don't you feel like we're traveling [music] back in time as we we are, you know, back and forth, >> move gently through, yet we live in one of the most dynamic modern cities on the planet? When we were planning this, I was thinking about the first Chinese movie ever being made. You know, it's called Ding Jun. M >> it's a very short movie uh produced at the very early stage of the 20th century the first ever of course the eventually the record of the movie was lost in the burning incident >> of yinguan >> of no no no of junan that's the first Chinese movie black and white but people uh these days try to make an AI version of it so it's about a Chinese general during the the waring states period of time sanu three kingdom. Yeah. So he how he played his role in making sure that they're going to hold on to the border.

[00:26:00]Something like that. Yeah. Amazing.

[00:26:02]>> It's Tin one of China's most legendary picking opera >> singers.

[00:26:09]>> Singers actually was the main role. It's amazing how movie then you know at the very early stage of 20th century in China people are looking at it >> over 100 years ago.

[00:26:20]>> Yeah. more than 100 years already.

[00:26:22]>> The the the the the vast wealth of stories to be told both >> ancient and contemporary. I mean I hear stories all the time even from the past um 50 years that amaze me because we've also seen you know imagine this in the 35 years that I have lived in China I have been witness to the fastest urbanization and industrialization in human history and it's incredible but there's also within you you can look at the buildings and cars and the development which is which is phenomenal. But the human stories that lie within this period, you know, of Chinese history need to be told. They need to be told. They need to be shared because they are amazing.

[00:27:17]>> We are talking about this. Amazing. I have goosebumps.

[00:27:21]>> I know. But but stories that I like I can't that even people I know for a long time. I've known people for a long time and a and a good friend of mine told me a story the other night that was just the resilience, the adapt adaptability. I mean, when I think about my mother-in-law who's going to be 100 years old this year and I think about when she was born and how she's lived and where she's lived and >> you know, it's it's it's truly incredible, >> right? We've been talking throughout the trip on this beautiful water. Time to sip some tea and relax.

[00:27:58]>> Of course. Fabulous.

[00:28:00]>> And for those of you that are watching us, thank you so much for [music] sharing this time back and forth in time.

[00:28:08]>> Well, thank you for having me today.

[00:28:09][music] It's just in one of my favorite spots in this fantastic city.

[00:28:14]>> I say welcome back home.

[00:28:16]>> Yes, cheers.

[00:28:18]>> Cheers.

[00:28:23]I know a [music] lot about my boat knowledge is excellent.

[00:28:34][music] Hey. Hey. Hey.

[00:28:40][music] [music]