China arthouse films make waves on foreign shores

BERLIN, Feb 18 (Reuters) While audiences half way across the world shower Chinese arthouse cinema with adulation and awards, finding viewers at home can seem much harder.

''Tuya's Marriage'', directed by Wang Quan'an, won the Berlin film festival's top award late on Saturday, following victory for another Chinese movie, ''Still Life'', in Venice in September.

Both are low-budget, slice-of-life dramas highlighting the environmental and human cost of the country's rapid economic expansion, but it is unlikely that either will fill Chinese movie theatres or fly off the shelves in the DVD stores.

Some Chinese directors in Berlin this year argued that the problem was the same as in any country, where blockbusters and romantic comedies dominate the box office at the expense of more serious, small-scale cinema.

But others believed the gap between the two movie ''genres'' had widened in China, making it harder to find backing for lower-budget pictures.

''I think this division is a very strange thing, and it is not normal to see it so pronounced as it is now in China,'' said Wang.

He argued that the distinction between arthouse and commercial cinema was not so wide 20 years ago when Zhang Yimou was making his acclaimed ''Red Sorghum'', which coincidentally also won the Berlin Golden Bear award in 1988.

''Back then we did not have such division -- it was an arthouse film, but it was seen by ordinary audiences around the world, it was a hit amongst intellectuals and critics as well as the ordinary audiences,'' Wang told Reuters.

''It's not good to have this strong division between the two genres.'' When he started filming ''Tuya's Marriage'', about a family of herders whose livelihood is threatened by the desertification of the Mongolian steppe, Wang recalls people saying nobody in China would want to see it except ''a few political officers''.

CENSORSHIP AND CINEMA Several directors said now was a good time to be making movies in China, despite the challenge of finding a home audience and ongoing tussles with the censors.

Zhang Yang, whose film ''Getting Home'' was showcased in Berlin this year outside the main competition, said it was a ''pretty good time'' for young directors.

''It is not like it was before, when a film was totally ripped to pieces and killed off and it would not pass (the censors) at all.'' Fang Li, producer of Berlin competition film ''Lost in Beijing'', added that Chinese cinema had moved on a long way from the days when the hero would tend to be the upstanding peasant.

He said censorship decisions were not motivated so much by politics, but by how the generations thought differently about sex, violence, gambling and other behaviour.

His movie underlines how censorship remains a major frustration for arthouse directors. The makers of the film about haves and have-nots in modern-day Beijing, had weeks of talks with state censors before finally agreeing on a revised version.

Due to the lack of time, though, Fang said the uncensored film was screened in Berlin, meaning possibly serious consequences for him and up-and-coming female director Li Yu.

In 2006, Lou Ye was banned from making films for five years after his ''Summer Palace'' was shown in Cannes without approval.

Li and others called for a ratings system similar to those used in the West rather than a simple 'yes' or 'no' decision.

''In China there is only one category,'' said Hong Kong producer Nansun Shi, who was on the jury in Berlin. ''Either it passes or it doesn't. This doesn't work any more.'' REUTERS PDM KP1732