SHANGHAI ON SCREEN 2006
 A season of classic and contemporary films from Chinas City of Cinema at Vue, West End 8–15 February 2006
Screenings also at
Museum in Docklands CHINA IN LONDON 2006 A Londonwide season celebrating all things Chinese. January–March 2006
Shanghai on Screen is part of China in London 2006, the largest celebration of Chinese arts, lifestyle and culture that London has ever seen. The season begins in January and includes the annual Chinese New Year parade and festival in central London, marking the start of the Year of the Dog. Other events will take place across the city, with activities ranging from exhibitions, performance and film to window displays and food tasting. Amongst the highlights are the Royal Academy of Arts’ exhibition China: The Three Emperors, 1662-1795, Chinese Poems on the Underground, a Beijing Olympics exhibition at City Hall, offers in West End stores and a Chinese lighting display at Oxford Circus, plus events at many of London’s museums, galleries and attractions.
For a list of events click here
A MESSAGE FROM THE MAYOR
As a big fan of cinema, it gives me huge pleasure to introduce Shanghai on Screen. As well as being one of the most dynamic and exciting cities in the world, Shanghai is the centre of the Chinese film industry, as it has been from the very beginnings of cinema a hundred years ago. The first Chinese films were made there, and today it is nourishing talents that are reaching a truly international audience. Shanghai is also the home of China’s premiere International Film Festival, and I am particularly pleased that London will be participating in the festival later this year. Shanghai on Screen offers Londoners and visitors a rare opportunity to get to know a range of classic and modern films from China’s ‘city of cinema’. Along with more than 100 other events at locations throughout the capital during China in London, there is much to enjoy, so whether your interest is film or a wide range of other art forms, my message is get out and experience just a little of what this vast country has to offer.
Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London
Introduction  As Wilson Yip’s slick romance Leaving Me Loving You demonstrates, China’s economic boom has transformed Shanghai into a twenty-first century global city, with more office skyscrapers than Manhattan and a higher population density than Hong Kong. For Chinese, this is not a surprise, but a return to its former status. In the 1930s, it was already the largest city in Asia and the epitome of everything modern and cosmopolitan in China.
There is something else special about Shanghai. Talk about movies in America, and people think of Hollywood. In China, they think of Shanghai. The country’s first full-length feature was produced there in 1923. By the 1930s, social issue melodramas created the Shanghai industry’s first golden age, dominated by silent screen sirens like Ruan Lingyu, star of The Goddess (1934). Even Hong Kong film is an offshoot of Shanghai, as some Shanghai based film-makers moved to Hong Kong in the 1930s to pursue making films in Cantonese rather than Mandarin Chinese.
Shanghai on Screen celebrates the city and its cinematic heritage, from the 1930s to the modern day. As well as The Goddess from the city’s first golden era, we are pleased to present Myriads of Light (1948), a classic from the interval between the end of the anti-Japanese War in 1945 and the formation of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. During the late 1930s, Shanghai was a refuge for Jews fleeing from Europe, as covered in Chen Yifei’s moving documentary, Escape to Shanghai (1999).
Shanghai continued as the cinema capital of the People’s Republic after 1949. As well as features, it produced unique animation films like Nezha Conquers the Dragon King (1980), based on China’s own artistic traditions. Shanghai’s return to the limelight has also made it the focus of many recent films. Leaving Me Loving You (2004) showcases the gleaming contemporary city as a setting for romance between canto-pop stars Leon Lai and Faye Wong. Local woman filmmaker Peng Xiaolian’s Shanghai Story (also 2004), picked up the Chinese equivalent of the Best Film Oscar for its depiction of Shanghai history through the lives of three generations of women.
Today, Shanghai is again the most international of Chinese cities. With over 500 cinemas ranging from brand new multiplexes to the art deco picture palaces of the thirties and China’s only international film festival, it continues to cater to the demands of its population for the most exciting of world cinema.
FOR TICKET AND ADMISSION DETAILS PLEASE CHECK WITH VUE WEST END OR MUSEUM IN DOCKLANDS.
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