120 years ago, the Lumière Brothers invented motion picture, which has come to be a great invention that France contributed to mankind. Since its inception, motion picture has rapidly spread to the rest of the world. Today, it has become the most popular form of mass culture, and an indispensable channel for people of different countries to know and communicate with each other. We started to cover the Cannes Film Festival on behalf of the China Movie Channel about ten years ago. The small town of Cannes, with its own population being only 70,000, received 150,000 filmmakers from across the globe. We interviewed Sophie Marceau, who has countless fans in China, and was pleasantly surprised when she readily promised to meet us again in China. The next year, she fulfilled her promise, and our camera accompanied her to travel half of the country. The journey with movies has given us infinite joy as well as infinite warmth. Ten years ago, I visited slums in Cape Town, South Africa, as a member of the Chinese film delegation. What we had absolutely not expected was that, a group of ragged children, with the brightest smiles we had ever seen on their faces, shouted loudly to us: “Jackie Chan! Jackie Chan!” I told Jackie about this when I saw him later, and he was moved to tears.
In 2000, Shinework Media started to produce the “World Film Report” in cooperation with the China Movie Channel. Through our programs, we introduced the rich and varied world film culture as well as cultures of other countries to almost 1 billion Chinese audiences. We also endeavored to promote Chinese movies and Chinese culture to the rest of the world. We have made good progress and won broad appreciation from governments of other countries as well as the film industry. Our current priority is to further expand and facilitate film and cultural exchanges between China and the world as a response to the “Belt and Road” Initiative.
This year, we launched the international co-production project and officially stepped into film production. Up to now, we have already signed co-production agreements with India, Iran, Kazakhstan and Indonesia. The agreements with Egypt, Greece, Cuba and Pakistan are in the pipeline. It is our hope that film co-production will facilitation common development and prosperity, and that the co-produced films will strengthen our understanding and friendship with people of other countries.
The “Belt and Road” Initiative has five pillars, namely, policy coordination, facilities connectivity, unimpeded trade, financial integration and people-to-people bonds. The film industry that we have dedicated ourselves in is exactly aimed to promoting the bonds among different peoples. We have been on this journey for 15 years, and had close contact with the film spheres of about 80 countries. As we march on, we firmly believe that the future will be ever brighter.
2015 is coming to a close. In this past year, we have witnessed all kinds of crisis and confrontations across the world. It seems that the world is on the brink of another cold war or even hot war. Such a grave situation means our work in promoting culture diversity and cross-cultural dialogue has just become more important and urgent. It is my sincere hope that all filmmakers across the world can join hands and work hard towards the understanding and reconciliation between different civilizations, cultures, and peoples.
I want to take this opportunity to extend my sincere gratitude to the French embassy in China as well as friends from other embassies for your enduring and unreserved support. My thanks also go to SARFT and the Film Bureau for your encouragement and help.