Not all "stones" are glittering in cinemas on the Chinese mainland this summer.

 

Winner of this year's Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, the South African film Tsotsi debuted in China on July 11. Without a big budget, fancy visual effect and stars, this high-quality movie did not benefit much from the Oscar in terms of its box office revenues.

 

Tsotsi tells the story of a tiny fraction of current township life, contrasting it with a fairly normal upper middle class family in South Africa. Tracing six days in the lonely, violent life of Tsotsi, a ruthless, young gang leader, it is touted as "a story about people, love, life, the choices the common people make, and situations the common people are sometimes pushed into."

 

Up to now, few South African films have made an impact in China. It might not be so surprising, therefore, to notice that the audience ratings of this movie in Beijing movie theaters are reportedly at an all-time low.

 

In UME International Cineplex, one of the city's major multiplexes, an unnamed ticket officer said, "very few people came for Tsotsi."

 

This failure is not shared by Western movies, however.

 

Several domestic movies have received similar cold shoulders from viewers.

 

From acting to directing and writing, pop idol Xu Jinglei is regarded by many to be China's most intellectual actress. She is also a hot star on the Internet for her daily blogs that have reportedly received millions of clicks from curious netizens.

 

Xu's previous movies include Letters from an Unknown Woman, starring Jiang Wen who acted in Zhang Yimou's Red Sorghum, and My Dad and I, starring Ye Daying, director of the film Red Cherry. Her latest film work entitled Dreams May Come (Meng Xiang Zhao Jin Xian Shi) debuted on June 30.

 

As the click rates of Xu's blog currently exceed 40 million, the media expected Dreams May Come would share the popularity of Xu's blog. However, the number of moviegoers is in no way matching the number of visitors to her blog.

 

The Forest Ranger (Tian Gou) and We Are Family (Zuo Lin You Li) are two other domestic movies that have also encountered setbacks in their box office revenues although some critics praised them for their realistic approach.

 

(China Daily July 25, 2006)